On Thursday, July 23, the West Harlem Community Preservation Organization, several community members, and three local elected officials — New York State Senator Cordell Cleare, New York State Assembly Members Al Taylor and Jordan Wright — filed a lawsuit to preserve the healthcare services our community relies on at 1727 Amsterdam Avenue.
Those services include care that is difficult to replace and that thousands of residents depend on: behavioral and mental health care, HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis treatment, pediatrics, primary care and family medicine, dentistry, dermatology, endocrinology, nutrition, ophthalmology, podiatry, and cardiovascular and diabetes care.
The suit challenges how the City approved this project. We contend that the approval failed to take the hard look the law requires at how demolition would displace these critical healthcare services. But whether the new apartments would be affordable to the people who actually live in West Harlem is also at stake. The record shows the City had a better option in front of it and passed it over. A community plan keeps the existing medical and mental-health services and builds far more of the housing that our residents most need: where the approved plan offers just 6 three-bedroom apartments, the community plan builds 51 at rents truly affordable to the income levels of our district. The City did not seriously weigh that alternative.
Below are the filed petition and the alternative plan developed by the community. Further below, please find out how you can support us!
Your support makes all the difference. Without our strong coalition of our diverse community members, this would have never happened. Please donate to continue our work. See here for more details on checks, or click below.