Text "Wild" to 72727 by July 1st for a chance to win a $200 gift card at Wild Olive Market.

Upcoming Events

Birthday Barbecue at Picture the Homeless

Come enjoy some great down-home barbecue and jumping music on our gorgeous new patio. You'll connect with our stellar community of changemakers and help us honor two luminaries (Lynne Lewis and Jean Rice) of social justice. Donations to support the important work accepted on site or online.

Friday June 26th 5-9pm 104 East 126th Street

Pride at Vendy Plaza

Food, Music and a Beer Garden at Vendy Plaza celebrating Pride Weekend
Sunday 12-6pm Park Avenue and E 116th Street

Community Planning Workshop for Citi Bike

Mayor DeBlasio has committed to expanding bike share as far north as 130th Street by the end of 2017. In light of this DOT is holding a community planning workshop for the CB11 area to discuss where stations should be located. This will be a public meeting open to all. It is a chance for residents and other stakeholders to weigh in on good station locations.
Tuesday, June 30th from 6-8pm at the Johnson Community Center, located at 1833 Lexington at 113th Street

Zumba in East Harlem

Come to the Julia de Borges cultural center to work up a sweat dancing to Zumba con Diego!
Every Thursday at 6:30 p.m.1680 Lexington Ave (103rd-104th Street)

Forward

Hi,

"I'm homeless and I'm hungry, can you please find it in your heart to help me?"

This refrain is well known to those who walk by the entrance to Metro Station on E 125th and Park. And yet we all to often ignore the appeal and harden our hearts: to respond to every homeless person who is asking for help or who is agitated and possibly experiencing a mental health crisis feels like an overwhelming task. But it doesn't have to be that way, New York's 311 app makes the process of contacting the city agency that helps the homeless effortless.

This app (available on iPhone or Android) allows us to request assistance for homeless people we see and within 2 hours, the city will come by and offer services like housing or help resolve a mental health crisis. So, download the app and the next time you see a homeless person without a place to sleep or who is experience some sort of mental health crisis, don't just walk by: let the city know and help that person get the services they need.

The reality is that these homeless men and women are part of our community on East 125th Street and that the solution to homelessness is not more law enforcement but better access to services like housing, vocational training and mental health services. That is not to say that steps shouldn't be taken to resolve issues here: Albany needs to pass a bill to stop the clustering of drug treatment clinics and the MTA needs to either move the M35 bus stop on Lexington or extend the route so that people from Ward's Island have more places in Manhattan to go than just 125th and Lexington.

We also need to recognize that the homeless population is not homogenous and that some of them are incredibly vulnerable, regularly getting robbed and assaulted by other homeless people looking for cash for their next 50 cent beer or bit of K2.

Here at NHEMA, we are excited to be working with the wonderful organization Picture the Homeless (recently relocated to E 126th) to organize a tree-pit planting day next week and to be starting a hopefully fruitful dialogue about ways to increase homeless services here in East Harlem.

In other news, Citi-Bikes is expanding into East Harlem and NHEMA is excited to a sponsor of the community planning meeting that will be discussing possible locations for these bike. Come and share your opinion on June 30th!

Also, the Wild Olive Mobile Marketing promotion ends next week so be sure to text "Wild" to 72727 before then for your chance to win $200 in groceries!

Until next week,

Your friends at NHEMA

P.S. Have questions for NHEMA? Want to be part of the East 125th Street Plaza when it opens in mid July? Have a community event you want to promote? Don't hesitate to get in touch with us!