These words could easily have been written by South Bronx activist Yolanda Garcia. In the early 1990s, she founded an organization known as We Stay/Nos Quedamos, and led a movement of residents who wanted to remain in their neighborhood despite the City’s plan to redevelop it with low-density, mixed-income housing.  They created an alternative plan for affordable housing development at Melrose Commons that is still being implemented today.

However, the words above are actually the opening statement of the Cooper Square Alternate Plan, written in 1961 by a group of activists from the Lower East Side, including Frances Goldin. Known as the Cooper Square Committee, they opposed Robert Moses’ urban renewal plan to demolish and redevelop more than 2,500 housing units in their neighborhood.

On July 13, the Municipal Art Society celebrated the kindred spirits of these two community activists by presenting the annual Yolanda Garcia Community Planner (YGCP) Award to Ms. Goldin. MAS created the YGCP award in 2006 to honor the memory of Ms. Garcia, who passed away in 2005. Selected from an open nomination process by a panel of judges consisting of former honorees and leaders in the community planning field, the awardee must have no formal training in planning, and must have demonstrated his or her ability to overcome the many obstacles to grassroots planning and bring neighborhood need and vision into New York City’s planning process.

Ms. Goldin came to the Lower East Side from Queens in 1944 as a newlywed of 20.  Shortly after her arrival, she went to a local group known as the 1st Ave. Tenant and Consumer Council to research her rent history because she thought her $75/month rent was too high. She became active with this group, and thus began a lifetime as a community organizer.

In 1959, Robert Moses proposed a massive urban renewal plan for the Lower East Side that would have displaced 2,400 tenants, 450 single-room occupants, 4000 homeless beds, and over 500 businesses. He intended to create 2,900 units of middle-income housing, which would have been out of financial reach of 93 percent of residents.

The Cooper Square Committee formed in response to this plan, and organized to create their own vision for the neighborhood’s future. “It was very easy to organize the group because people were directly affected,” said Goldin, who added that they coordinated over 100 community meetings in a year.  The resulting Cooper Square Alternate Plan included public housing, Mitchell-Lama co-ops, other cooperative housing, resettlement and rehabilitation facilities, and artist housing.  The group based the proposal on two main principles:

1. the people who live on the site should be the beneficiaries, not the victims, of the plan;
2. And, no tenant should be relocated outside the community.

The City approved a modified version of it in 1970.

In his book New York for Sale, Tom Angotti wrote, “The Cooper Square Alternate Plan would have died an early death if it weren’t for the radical and often militant organizing behind it.” Goldin was heavily involved in the actions opposing rent hikes and supporting an affordable and diverse Lower East Side. For example, at one point the group erected teepees on Houston Street and slept outside to protest rising rents. “You have to have the professional and the media, but unless you have the troops, you have nothing,” she said.

Delays plagued implementation of the Cooper Square Alternate Plan initially, but in the 1970s and 80s, the Committee was active in maintaining and creating affordable housing.  Some of their early projects included renovation of over 320 apartment units, construction of the 146-unit low-income Thelma Burdick Houses, and renovation of the Cube Building to house formerly homeless families.  Today, the Cooper Square Committee owns 23 buildings, and maintains their affordability in perpetuity in the rapidly gentrifying Lower East Side through the Cooper Square Mutual Housing Association.

The Cooper Square Alternate Plan is widely considered to be the first community-based plan created in New York City.  Goldin and her “comrades in struggle” (as she refers to her neighbors) set an example that has influenced countless activists and advocacy planners who followed.  Though she recently celebrated her 85th birthday, age has not dampened her activist spirit.  She continues to work with the Cooper Square Committee, and to manage Frances Goldin Literary Agency, which represents authors of literary fiction and political non-fiction, including Barbara Kingsolver, Adrienne Rich, and Mumia Abu Jamal.

Her agency’s website states that Goldin, “considers herself very lucky to have no dichotomy between her radical politics and her working life.” Most importantly, she continues to inspire other activists, and encourages others to become, “the spark that lights the flame.” Pratt Professor Ron Shiffman agrees that Frances’ work lights the way for others:
“Frances Goldin not only worked and organized in her own community, but she has been arrested more times then she can remember in civil disobedience activities ranging from stopping bulldozers to fighting for the release of Mumia Abu-Jamal from prison. She is a passionate and dedicated individual who paved the way for many. She possesses many of the attributes and virtues that I believe Yolanda Garcia would have respected. My only regret is that I never introduced the two to each other.”

Ms. Goldin accepted the $1,500 award at the Municipal Art Society’s annual meeting on July 13.  For more information on the Cooper Square Alternate Plan, visit Planning for All New Yorkers, an Atlas of Community-based Plans.

Photos courtesy Joyce Ravitz and Sally Goldin.

“It is an honor for us to be able to recognize all of these unsung heroes and institutions that contribute to New York City’s greatness and we are privileged to do so every year,” said Vin Cipolla, president of MAS.

For 38 years, the MAS has bestowed its Annual Awards on outstanding individuals, groups and events that help define the unique character of New York. Nominations were submitted by Municipal Art Society members and reviewed by an awards committee chaired by Carole Rifkind. Committee members included Thelma Golden, Hugh Hardy, Janet C. Ross, and Alberto Vourvoulias-Bush.

Past MAS Annual Award winners include the City’s 311 Service, Strand Bookstore, Katz’s Delicatessen, Brooklyn Bridge Park “beach,” the Brooklyn Cyclones, the 9/11 Volunteers, Louise Nevelson, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and many others.

In addition to the Annual Awards, MAS presented its fourth annual Yolanda Garcia Community Planner Award to Frances Goldin, 85, of Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Goldin led the creation of the Cooper Square Alternate Plan, widely considered to be New York City’s first community-based plan, and today continues to work with the Cooper Square Committee and the Frances Goldin Literary Agency.

MAS also presented the W. Allison and Elizabeth Stubbs Davis Award to a deserving employee of the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. This year, MAS salutes Brian Aucoin for his achievements in conservation as director of GreenApple Corps and manager of the city’s Million Trees Training Program.

Below are detailed descriptions about this year’s honorees:

Human Rights Watch International Film Festival

Twenty years ago Human Rights Watch launched its International Film Festival in New York City to heighten public awareness of the often-dire need for vigilance in safeguarding human rights around the world. Presenting documentary, fiction, and animated films, the festival brings the most elemental of rights issues to the attention of the people of our city, and makes all the more eloquent the organization’s call for New Yorkers to stand up for the sanctity and security of every individual.

Brooklyn Flea

With its picturesque Clinton Hill-Fort Greene setting and savvy blogosphere personality, Brooklyn Flea is a happy manifestation of private sector spirit yielding generous public benefits. Attracting 20,000 visitors on its opening weekend, this alternative to big-boxretail provides a venue for hundreds of small, local merchants and a destination for New Yorkers who are mingling, sampling gourmet treats, and finding great bargains.

IRT: A Tragedy in Three Stations

“Being a Play of Two Eras and One Glorious Subway System,” as ye olde posters informed mass transit audiences, IRT: A Tragedy in Three Stations told the story of the building of the New York City subway system. Enlivening subway platforms from Downtown Brooklyn to Upper Manhattan for a mere six evenings, the play made ingenious use of the city as a stage and gave straphangers a serendipitous experience of their shared commute that was definitely out of the ordinary, if not off the beaten track.

Sustainable Streets Strategic Plan for the New York City Department of Transportation 2008 and Beyond
This strategic plan by the DOT shows a commitment to making the streets of New York a great collection of public spaces. Turning from the age-old tradition of intending streets as solely for vehicles, this new vision gives cyclists greater safety and a sense of belonging, and it transforms some of the city’s dangerous and clogged intersections into public plazas. MAS celebrates these breakthroughs in dealing with city traffic, and eagerly awaits all the improvements that this vision promises for more enlightened and sustainable streetscape planning.

Center for New York City Law
Sir Francis Bacon said: Knowledge is power. The Center for New York City Law, at New York Law School, has bestowed both on the public by revolutionizing access to New York City’s arcane world of administrative agencies. It has gathered tens of thousands of their rulings, decisions and opinions and placed them in a database where everyone can find them online, the better to understand municipal decision-making processes. Moreover, the Center’s highly informative publications, CityLaw and CityLand, bring current administrative agency news to their subscribers. MAS salutes these herculean feats.

Frances Goldin, 2009 Yolanda Garcia Community Planner Award Recipient
Shortly after arriving on Manhattan’s Lower East Side in 1944, Frances Goldin became a community organizer, working in solidarity with her neighbors on issues of daily survival, like housing and food prices. In 1959, Robert Moses proposed a massive urban renewal plan for the Lower East Side that would have displaced 2,400 tenants. Ms. Goldin organized neighbors to create the Cooper Square Alternate Plan, widely considered to be the first community-based plan created in New York City. The plan included public housing, Mitchell-Lama co-ops, other cooperative housing, resettlement and rehabilitation facilities, and artist housing and the City approved a modified version of it in 1970. Today, the Cooper Square Committee owns 23 buildings, and maintains their affordability in perpetuity in the rapidly gentrifying Lower East Side through the Cooper Square Mutual Housing Association. At 85, Ms. Goldin continues to work with the Cooper Square Committee, and to manage Frances Goldin Literary Agency, which represents authors of literary fiction and political non-fiction.

Visit www.mas.org/ygcpa for more information about the Yolanda Garcia Community Planner Award and past year’s recipients.

To highlight community-based planning in New York ahead of this year’s YCGP award, this podcast is the second in a series of three interviews with previous award recipients. If you would like to nominate someone for this year’s award, visit www.mas.org/awards.

In 2007, MAS presented the second annual YGCP award to Elizabeth Yeampierre for her work with the United Puerto Rican Organization of Sunset Park (UPROSE), which has engaged local residents, particularly youth, in multiple community planning and environmental justice initiatives along the Sunset Park waterfront in Brooklyn. Last year’s winner was Jeanne DuPont, Executive Director of the Rockaway Waterfront Alliance. The award recognized her work engaging a diverse community and local youth in open space and environmental issues on the barrier island of Far Rockaway, Queens.

MAS will accept nominations online for the 2009 YGCP award now through May 29. For a printed copy of the nomination form, please contact us.

Award Criteria

The MAS Planning Center is once again seeking to present the YGCP award to a community planner who embodies the spirit of the work of Garcia and Nos Quedamos. The award will be presented to an individual who has demonstrated his or her ability to overcome the many obstacles to grassroots, community-based planning and has succeeded in bringing neighborhood need and vision into New York City’s planning process. The award recipient must:

• Work on a placed-based community plan aimed at addressing local needs, limiting displacement, and improving the overall quality of life for neighborhood residents;
• Be a self-taught planner (with no formal academic or professional training as a planner);
• Work in a low- to moderate-income community within NYC’s five boroughs;
• Use an inclusive, community-driven approach that values participation and the use of local knowledge;
• Have a proactive approach to planning focusing not only on advocacy, but the actual creation and implementation of a community-based plan.

Nominations are to be submitted as essays, not to exceed 500 words, by a person familiar with the nominee’s work. Please visit click here to download the online nomination form.

Nominations will be reviewed by the YGCP award selection committee. Past members have included Nos Quedamos Executive Director Yolanda Gonzalez, City Planning Commissioner Karen Philips, Hunter College Professor Tom Angotti, Pratt Center for Community Development Director Emeritus Ron Shiffman, Good Old Lower East Side Executive Director Damaris Reyes, and others.

The recipient will be honored at the Municipal Art Society’s annual meeting in summer 2009.

Ms. Garcia’s family owned a carpet shop in the Melrose section of the Bronx, where she was working in the early 1990s when she learned of a City urban renewal plan that called for displacing local residents and creating low-density housing. Incensed that those residents who stayed in the South Bronx despite decades of disinvestment were going to be displaced, Ms. Garcia founded Nos Quedamos/We Stay. This grassroots group was dedicated to rethinking the plan, including the community in the process, and preventing displacement. The resulting Melrose Commons plan helped to create over 1,500 units of affordable housing in the area, kept thousands of residents from being displaced, and even brought green building principles to the South Bronx.

Speakers at the ceremony, including Council Member Maria del Carmen Arroyo, Congressman Jose E. Serrano, State Senator Jose M. Serrano, and Assembly Members Michael Benjamin and Ruben Diaz, Jr., among others, praised Ms. Garcia for her nurturing, her intelligence, and even her unrelenting “nudge-i-ness” when it came to advocating for her neighborhood. “When the history books are written, there’s going to be a wonderful story not only of how this borough went from ruin to revitalization, but how it led the nation,” said Diaz, Jr.

Ms. Garcia’s daughter, Yolanda Gonzalez, took over Nos Quedamos after her mother suffered a heart attack at the Nos Quedamos office in February 2005. Ms. Garcia was just 53. Wearing red in honor of American Heart Month, Ms. Gonzalez encouraged everyone in the crowd to “Take care of your mom.”

The Municipal Art Society honors Ms. Garcia’s memory every year with the Yolanda Garcia Community Planner Award. Nominations for the 2009 award will be open in March.

Two years in the making, City of Water explores the aspirations of public officials, environmentalists, academics, community activists, recreational boaters and everyday New Yorkers for a diverse, vibrant waterfront at a time when the shoreline is changing faster than at any other time in New York’s history. The documentary features interviews with Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff, US Representative Nydia Velazquez, MacArthur Fellow Majora Carter, author Phillip Lopate, Sandy Hook Pilots’ Captain Andrew McGovern and others, and includes footage from Jamaica Bay, the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and many other places on the waterfront.

The YGCP award was created to commemorate the work of Ms. Yolanda Garcia, a community activist in the South Bronx. Under Ms. Garcia’s leadership, the residents of Melrose challenged the city, created an alternative to an urban renewal plan, and transformed a neighborhood. Each year, the MAS Planning Center presents an award and $2,500 cash prize to a community-based planner whose work embodies the spirit of Ms. Garcia. Yolanda Gonzalez, Executive Director of Nos Quedamos and daughter of Yolanda Garcia will be presenting Ms. DuPont with the YGCP Award at the MAS Annual Meeting on July 9th.

About Yolanda Garcia
In the late 1980’s the Melrose section of the Bronx was presented with an urban renewal plan that would displace long-time community residents and businesses. The plan, which had been developed with almost no community input, encountered overwhelming community opposition. At the time, Melrose had a population of nearly 6,000 people and epitomized the devastation experienced in the South Bronx during the 1960’s and 70’s—abandoned buildings, vacant lots, and little public or private investment. Remaining residents and businesses were adamant about staying and improving their neighborhood. Shepherded by Ms. Garcia, We Stay/Nos Quedamos was created to organize the community around creating and advocating for a plan based on community need and derived through consensus.

Under Ms. Garcia’s leadership and at the request of the Bronx Borough President, Nos Quedamos created an alternative plan for the neighborhood, working in conjunction with the Department of City Planning and the Department of Housing Preservation and Development. Today Melrose Commons is a mixed-use, mixed income development—portions of which were built by We Stay/Nos Quedamos. The plan, which focused on limiting displacement, has significantly improved the physical and economic environment of the neighborhood and has improved the quality of life for local residents. Furthermore, the process, which was community led, empowered local residents to become engaged in their community.

Although Ms. Garcia had no formal training as a planner, she was an expert on her community and believed in the power of local knowledge. Instead of simply organizing the community around stopping the city’s urban renewal plan, she organized her community to become proactive. In a planning environment where community is sometimes an afterthought, Ms. Garcia’s courage and confidence in her community’s ability to plan is even more impressive than the high level of planning proficiency she gained leading her community through this process. The work of Ms. Garcia and We Stay/Nos Quedamos is a compelling example of what communities can accomplish when they claim an active role in planning their futures.

Award Criteria
This year the Planning Center is seeking to present the YGCP award to a community planner who embodies the spirit of the work of Ms. Garcia and Nos Quedamos. The award will be presented to an individual who has demonstrated his or her ability to overcome the many obstacles to grassroots, community-based planning and has succeeded in bringing neighborhood need and vision into New York City’s planning process. The award recipient must:

• - Work on a placed-based community plan aimed at addressing local needs, limiting displacement, and improving the overall quality of life for neighborhood residents
• - Be a self-taught planner with no formal, academic, or professional training as a planner
• - Work in a low to moderate income community within NYC’s five boroughs
• - Use an inclusive, community-driven approach that values participation and the use of local knowledge
• - Have a proactive approach to planning focusing not only on advocacy but the actual creation and implementation of a community-based plan.

Nominations are to be submitted as essays, not to exceed 500 words, by a person familiar with the applicant’s work. Nominate someone online.

Nominations will be reviewed by the YGCP awards selection committee. Past members have included Yolanda Gonzalez, Nos Quedamos Executive Director, Karen Philips, City Planning Commissioner, Tom Angotti, Hunter College Professor, Ron Shiffman, Pratt Institute Professor, and Micaela Birmingham, New Yorkers for Parks.

The recipient will receive a $2,500 cash gift and will be honored at a ceremony in early July.

Important Dates
May 5 – Announcement of the award and call for nominations
May 30 – End of nomination period
July 9 – Award presentation

For questions, please contact Lacey Tauber, Community Liaison at 212-935-3960 or via e-mail at ltauber@mas.org.

We look forward to your participation!

A certificate for lifetime achievement was awarded to community board veteran Wilma Maynard of Bedford Stuyvesant. Certificates of honorable mention were presented to Damaris Reyes of the Lower East Side and Harry Bubbins of Mott Haven. Certificate of honorable mention recipient Laura Hoffman of Greenpoint, was unable to attend the event but received her certificate and flowers the following day from her neighbor and fellow activist Julie Lawrence.

The award ceremony and reception was a zero waste event at which no plastic was used and all waste was composted. Local jobs were supported through procurement of locally-grown and produced food and beverages.
To learn more about community-based planning, and about the achievements of the award recipients, click here.