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I have spent my entire life in the Bronx.

I was born here. Raised here. My roots are right here on 194th Street and Decatur Avenue. The Bronx isn’t just where I live, it’s part of who I am. It shaped me, challenged me, and taught me what community looks like. That’s why it’s so hard to watch the place I love struggle in ways that feel both familiar and entirely new.

Lately, I’ve found myself asking a question that I can’t seem to answer.

What came first….the chicken or the egg?

Does the condition of our borough reflect the people who live here? Or does it reflect years of leadership that has failed to protect, invest in, and inspire our communities? Or, if we’re being honest, is it a combination of both?

Before we can answer that question, we also have to be honest about our history.

The Bronx didn’t arrive here overnight.

Long before today’s conversations about public safety, sanitation, or quality of life, our borough experienced decades of disinvestment. The 1970s became synonymous with “The Bronx is Burning,” but that wasn’t simply a story about buildings on fire. It was the visible result of policies that allowed entire neighborhoods to be abandoned, families to be displaced, public services to deteriorate, and hope to slowly disappear. Entire generations grew up feeling like the Bronx had been written off.

When a community is neglected long enough, that neglect doesn’t just damage buildings, it begins to shape expectations. People stop believing they deserve better. They stop expecting clean streets, thriving parks, or responsive leadership because they’ve spent decades being shown otherwise.

Maybe that’s the hardest part of all. Physical neighborhoods can be rebuilt far more easily than a community’s belief in itself.

When I was a child, seeing crack vials and discarded needles on the sidewalk wasn’t unusual. As the years went by, it felt like we were making progress. The streets became cleaner. There was hope that we were turning a corner.

Today, it feels like we’re slipping backward.

Needles and drug paraphernalia are becoming common sights again. A few years back, a truck regularly parked near Poe Park to distribute clean drug-use supplies. I understood the public health argument behind it, but I couldn’t help wondering: Was this the best we could offer? Were we treating the symptoms while ignoring the disease? Where was the equal investment in recovery, prevention, mental health, housing, and hope?

Then there’s the dumping.

Somewhere along the way, parts of my neighborhood became a place where people feel comfortable dropping off mattresses, broken furniture, air conditioners, and whatever else they no longer want. They don’t live here, but they leave their trash here, because I guess to the naked eye, we already live there in squalor so if we don’t give a fuck why should they?🤷🏾‍♀️

And then there’s the dog shit.

I know it seems small compared to everything else, but it’s not. It says something about how we value the spaces we all share. Every day people walk past sidewalks and tree beds covered in dog shit, and somewhere along the way we accepted that as normal. I can’t accept that. I refuse to believe that’s the standard our community should settle for.

Our tree beds tell another story.

The overwhelming majority are neglected, filled with litter, weeds, and dog shit instead of flowers, greenery, or signs of neighborhood pride. Organizations like Bronx Is Blooming, Big Reuse, GreenUp, and others are doing incredible work across the borough, but too often neighborhoods like mine seem to be left out of those conversations. Why?

These aren’t rhetorical questions.

They’re questions I genuinely wrestle with because I love this borough enough to ask them.

Is this a leadership problem? Is it a community problem? Have residents become so accustomed to dysfunction that we’ve become desensitized and just stopped expecting better? Or have people stopped believing leadership will ever deliver it?

Maybe it’s all of those things, because they can absolutely all be true at once

What I do know is this: I don’t write these words from a place of criticism. I write them from a place of love.

Because when you love something, you don’t ignore its flaws, you confront them.

I have seen what happens when neighbors organize. I’ve watched blocks transform because ordinary people refused to wait for someone else to fix them. I’ve seen children reclaim streets through Open Streets. I’ve watched tree beds come back to life. I’ve seen strangers become neighbors simply because someone decided to care first.

That’s the Bronx I know.

That’s the Bronx I believe in.

This isn’t a love letter because I think the Bronx is perfect.

It’s a love letter because I believe we’re worth fighting for.

Maybe the better question isn’t whether leadership failed us or whether we’ve failed ourselves.

Maybe the question is: What are each of us willing to do to make sure the next generation inherits a Bronx that’s better than the one we have today?

Because I still believe paradise isn’t something you find.

Sometimes, it’s something you build.

People ask me all the time why I love the Bronx so much.

And honestly... I understand the question.

The Bronx has been talked about, talked down to, studied, criticized, overlooked, and underestimated for as long as I can remember. Turn on the news and you'll hear about the crime, the poverty, the vacant lots, the failing schools, the food deserts, the disinvestment. Depending on who's telling the story, you'd think there was nothing here worth celebrating.

But that's never been the Bronx I've known.

I've lived in this borough my entire life (45 years). This is where I learned what community means. It's where I learned that if your mother needed something, the neighbor across the hall showed up. It's where every block has elders who know every child's name. It's where cultures collide in the most beautiful way, where music pours from apartment windows, where food tells stories from every corner of the world, and where resilience isn't something people talk about, it's simply how we live.

Does the Bronx have problems?

Absolutely.

A million of them.

And pretending they don't exist doesn't help anyone.

But here's what I've learned over the years: if all you ever see are the problems, you'll never notice the potential.

I see possibility where others see blight.

I see future leaders riding bicycles on sidewalks.

I see entrepreneurs selling homemade food from folding tables.

I see artists creating beauty on brick walls.

I see grandparents raising another generation with more love than money.

I see neighbors who refuse to give up on one another.

I see home.

That's why Decatur Block Association exists.

Not because we think we can solve every issue facing our borough, but because we believe every block deserves someone willing to try.

Today was one of those reminders.

Today marked the opening day of Play Street 2026, and without question it was the strongest opening day we've had since partnering with NYC DOT's Open Streets program three years ago.

For five hours, our little stretch of Decatur Avenue transformed into exactly what neighborhoods should be.

Children raced scooters down the street without worrying about traffic. Basketballs bounced from one end of the block to the other. Sidewalk chalk became masterpieces. Music filled the air. Parents relaxed. Neighbors who normally wave in passing actually had time to sit and talk.

For a few hours, the street belonged to the people again.

People often ask me what community development looks like.

It looks like this.

It looks like children laughing so hard they forget about their phones.

It looks like parents who couldn't afford summer camp knowing their kids still have somewhere safe, joyful, and full of possibility to spend the day.

It looks like volunteers giving up their own time because they believe every child deserves a childhood.

It looks like neighbors deciding that if something is missing, they'll build it themselves.

Play Street isn't just a program.

It's a statement.

It's us saying that a child's summer shouldn't be determined by their family's income.

It's us reclaiming public space for community instead of traffic.

It's proof that transformation doesn't always require millions of dollars. Sometimes it starts with folding tables, chalk, basketballs, committed volunteers, and people who refuse to believe their neighborhood has to stay the way it is.

This is why I do this work.

Not because I think the Bronx is perfect.

But because I know what it can become.

Every time I see a child smile on our block, every time I watch neighbors connect, every time another person decides to invest in our community instead of giving up on it, I'm reminded that paradise isn't a place you find.

Sometimes it's a place you build.

So welcome to Bronx Paradise.

Not because everything here is perfect.

But because I believe paradise begins the moment a community decides it's worth fighting for.

#BronxParadise #Community #DecaturBlockAssociation #DOTOpenstreets #TheBronx #District15