The Harlem Neighborhood Block Association

Neighbors united to improve the quality of life in Harlem

Tag: Image Nation

988

Posted on by Harlem Shill

All New Yorkers know 311 and 911 are the numbers to call for issues (311) and emergencies (911). But, starting today, dialing 988 will connect you to a combined mental health, suicide prevention and substance use disorder response team. This new 988 number is part of a nationwide initiative to better address those needs without always involving the police.

Calls to 988 from local area codes will route to NYC Well, a 24/7 hotline, chat and text service where mental health professionals provide support and offer referrals for treatments and resources. If needed, the hotline staff can dispatch a Mobile Crisis Team, which includes mental health professionals, to an urgent but “non-emergency” situation. But those units only go out between 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.

988 is intended to address issues that are not criminal justice issues, but still require professional assistance.

Anyone can call 988 and a person from NYC Well, operated by Vibrant Emotional Health, will answer the call, listen to concerns and provide guidance about how to handle the situation, share resources or possibly dispatch members of the Mobile Crisis Unit — when available.

On scene, a counselor may speak to a person from the other side of the bedroom door, for example, or help them go to a clinic safely, and the team members may also stay in touch with a caller or concerned friend or family member for a period of time after the crisis to make sure they’re getting the support they need.

A huge hitch with this roll-out of 988 is phone technical – people who live in New York City and use cellphones that don’t have a local area code will not be routed to NYC Well, but to the local hotline as the area code indicates.

That means if you got your phone in Idaho, your 988 call is going to a mental health team in Boise…

Let’s hope they get this rediculous situation sorted out, but if you call 911, you can always stress this is a mental health crisis, and the operators will connect you to 988 resources.

The Studio Museum Rises

The Studio Museum of Harlem has now risen far beyond its neighbors. Admittedly the number of floors is low (because much of the space is for displaying/storing art), but the building is soaring above 125th Street between Lenox and ACP.

See Wax Print, Tonight

Click here.

This ImageNation x FDBA program is co-presented with Harlem Needle Arts.

About the Film:
Wax Print traces the vast and multi-stranded global history of a fabric that has become an iconic symbol of Africa and her children worldwide. This beautiful, transnational two-year journey has taken director Aiwan Obinyan around the world, in search of African wax prints and the untold story of how wax print fabric came to symbolize a continent, its people, and their struggle for freedom.
The film brings forth issues of fast fashion and mass-produced wax print copies, while detailing an Indonesian, English, and Dutch history of the fabric itself and its significance for pan-African identities. As seen in Batik and Kente techniques, bright bold patterns and colors become a significant part of the culture, as well as the identities of the African diaspora that have kept the heritage alive. With names like “The Ungrateful Husband,” which is worn by women to shame their disloyal husbands, each wax print has a pattern and identity embodied in the cloth, and an origin story that is then accepted and integrated into the culture by consumers.

Landmarking Survey of Lower East Harlem to be Conducted

Posted on by Harlem Shill

Ascendant is announcing that they have won a grant to survey lower East Harlem for buildings that should be considered for landmarking:

About Ascendant Neighborhood Development Corporation:
Ascendant Neighborhood Development (AND) builds homes, engages community members, and
partners with allies to raise up neighborhoods that provide stability and access to opportunity for all.
Since its founding in 1988, AND has supported the stabilization and growth of East and Central Harlem
communities, advocated for preservation of affordable housing, and helped thousands of New Yorkers
live with dignity and respect. Learn more: https://ascendant.nyc/

The El Barrio/Southern East Harlem survey area is a diverse mixed-use enclave within the larger Harlem community of Northern Manhattan. In addition to a variety of vernacular residential buildings dating from the late-1800s through the early-1900s, the area features several large-scale mid-20th century residential complexes including multiple public housing campuses. 
The survey area boasts many outstanding civic, institutional, and religious structures of various architectural styles. Within the proposed study area are multiple individually designated landmarks, including Public School 109, 28th Police Precinct & Fire Engine Co. #53 Houses, St. Cecilia’s Church Complex, Public School 72/Julia de Burgos Cultural Center, and the Museum of the City of New York.
The area developed over many decades as a predominantly working-class neighborhood, and it has been home to a succession of immigrant groups. The new survey will focus specific attention on the history of El Barrio’s Puerto Rican community and its impact on the (re)development of the neighborhood.
Ascendant, and our partners in the Landmark East Harlem (LEH) alliance, successfully worked to list the East Harlem Historic District on the State and National Registers of Historic Places in 2019. We successfully secured a determination of eligibility for the proposed East-Central Harlem Historic District in 2020, and we are working on a nomination to list that historic district in 2021. Ascendant and LEH, along with other local stakeholders, will use our new $12,000 Preserve New York grant to hire Marissa Marvelli to conduct the El Barrio/Southern East Harlem Cultural Resource Survey. The survey will help to identify potential individual State and National Register listings and the boundaries of potential new historic districts.

On 110th Street

The intersection of 110th Street and 3rd Avenue was ground zero for activism by The Young Lords.

In 1969, a group of New York City youth known as the Young Lords demanded change in the way the largest city in the United States handled sanitation. The initiative, known as the Garbage Offensive, wasn’t the group’s original plan of action, but it proved highly effective in calling out the needs and rights of the city’s Latinx community

The Young Lords were an activist group of poor and working-class Puerto Rican youth who modeled themselves after the Black Panthers, donned their signature purple berets, called for Puerto Rico’s independence, and hit the streets in search of a lofty organizing agenda in their home of East Harlem. But as the organization’s chairman, Felipe Luciano, humorously remembers, they found trash talk instead. 

“So we’re on 110th Street and we actually asked the people, ‘What do you think you need? Is it housing? Is it police brutality?’” Luciano says. “And they said, ‘Muchacho, déjate de todo eso—LA BASURA!” [Listen kid, fuggedaboutit! It’s THE GARBAGE!] And I thought, my God, all this romance, all this ideology, to pick up the garbage?”

To read the whole article, see:

https://www.history.com/news/young-lords-garbage-offensive

Learn About The Revolutionary Battle of Harlem Heights

https://www.nps.gov/planyourvisit/event-details.htm?id=889D6D1A-FF9D-B135-CC80D9825B084FE5

Join the Parks Service on a virtual tour of the Battle of Harlem Heights. Details in the link, above.

The Wiz, Tonight

Just a friendly reminder  . . . tomorrow, Friday, September 24th is our final night of Movies @ ERP Summer 2021.  East River Plaza and ImageNation Outdoors Movie Festival welcome you to join us for The Wiz.  The event starts at 6:30 pm. 

It’s free, but space is limited.  Please remember to RSVP at East River Plaza Movie Night. 

Please to share with your families, friends and neighbors

Tonight