The following interview is the first in a series focusing on how the MAS Planning Center’s Livable Neighborhoods Program (LNP) has helped New Yorkers tackle planning-related challenges in their neighborhoods head-on. Since 2007, the LNP has provided resources and training to nearly 400 New Yorkers. Learn more about it and upcoming training sessions here.

Donnelly Marks (pictured) is a professional photographer who decided to become more involved in her community (Astoria, Queens), in 2002. As part of the Norwood Neighborhood Association (NNA), Donnelly quickly learned that “…pictures were a very useful tool; helpful when making a presentation to the community board, the press, City Council, etc.” Donnelly uses pictures to document areas of concern and to highlight achievements on her neighborhood association’s website. In October of last year, she attended the Livable Neighborhoods Program (LNP) training at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, taking workshops in Historic Preservation and Using Maps and Data.

What made you want to devote a Saturday afternoon to learning more about neighborhood planning?
Juan Camilo Osorio from MAS attended our community board meeting (Astoria CB1) last fall. Our son made comments in the meeting and afterwards Juan told us about the GIS (Geographic Information Systems) workshop and Livable Neighborhood workshops. The program name alone “Livable Neighborhood” says it all. When Juan Camilo explained the LNP workshop offered a chance to learn from planning, preservation and GIS experts in a professional and friendly setting, how could anyone resist? Continue Reading>>

Last month, Chinatown’s neighborhood advocates placed a strong vote of confidence in the power of proactive community planning. The Chinatown Working Group — comprising over 40 community-based organizations and three community boards — has been meeting for over a year to hash out the issues that matter most to the people who live, work, and go to school in the neighborhood. The MAS Planning Center provided support to the Working Group process early on by providing area maps and timely information on community-initiated planning.

The group voted to pursue a 197-a plan—one of the City’s most comprehensive planning tools. Named for the section of the City’s Charter that enables them, 197-a plans provide a way to capture a community vision and translate that vision into policies and strategies. (You can view summaries of all of the City’s adopted 197-a plans here.) The Chinatown Working Group has already begun work identifying themes and principles that will guide their work over the coming year. Continue Reading>>

In a cramped meeting room in Washington Heights, a high school student scurries to set up a laptop and projector. Searching for a free surface in an already packed room, she makes her best effort to connect cords and load her presentation quickly before the committee chairperson calls to order the community board meeting, the student’s very first. The student, Nicole Lugo, is one of over thirty students who have been selected to work at their community board as part of the MAS Planning Center’s CITI Youth program. Across the city, students like Nicole are attending their local community board meetings—projecting maps and creating presentations that correspond to the items being discussed. Continue Reading>>

Last Saturday, MAS, the Pratt Graduate Center for Planning and the Environment (GCPE), and the Pratt Institute Planning Student Association sponsored the Livable Neighborhoods Program at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. Students of Pratt and other city universities, joined members of the local community for a half-day of training sessions focused on the public’s role in New York’s planning decisions.

Launched in 2007, the Livable Neighborhoods Program (LNP) provides New Yorkers with the tools and resources necessary to effectively plan their neighborhoods. GCPE has recognized the value of the program to train incoming students on planning processes in New York City.

For more information on the LNP, visit MAS.org/lnp.

MAS recently sat down with four young people from the Bronx and Brooklyn who are confronting neighborhood planning challenges head-on. Armed with information, enthusiasm and a supportive network of adults, these young people are taking the lead in addressing critical neighborhood issues.

In Sunset Park, Brooklyn, Caesar Alcaite and Celeste Del Brey (pictured at left) have been working with UPROSE, a community-based environmental justice organization. When they came to UPROSE, neither had much knowledge of environmental justice issues. However, after spending more time at the organization and working with youth organizers, these teens quickly learned that there is a connection between their local environment and their quality of life. Since coming to UPROSE these teens have developed strong leadership skills — reaching out to neighbors to inform them of local environmental concerns; helping middle school students map neighborhood assets and burdens; and leading neighborhood environmental justice tours for city officials, other youth groups, and most recently, a group of 50 Columbia University graduate planning students. Continue Reading>>

There was a time in New York when the appointment of a young person to a community board made the headlines (or close to it). That was back in 1977, when the word “planning” was still a part of the term to describe the 50-member, unsalaried community boards that represent the city’s 59 districts (there were 62 boards in 1977). Current Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer is a case in point. His commitment to public service spans three decades. Appointed to Manhattan Community Board 12 (Washington Heights/Inwood) at the age of 16, Stringer learned the value of public participation and community involvement at an early age.

In a 1977 interview with the New York Times, a then-teenaged Stringer already had ideas for his community: “My board could be supportive of after-school programs and at least get a committee going — go into schools and organize activities like escort service for old people, cleaning up the parks and all sorts of things (sic).” Continue Reading>>

New York is a young city. With a population of over eight million people, 27 percent are below the age of 19, with 10 percent between the ages of 12 and 19. Young people are an integral part of the fabric of New York, representing more than a quarter of the population in neighborhoods such as the South Bronx, East New York, and Corona. Teens, particularly, make intensive use of the public spaces, businesses, and parks and playgrounds in their own neighborhoods and in neighborhoods where they attend school. Issues critical to the quality of life for young people, such as public safety, public health, and a clean environment are part and parcel of debates over urban planning and development, but youth participation in neighborhood decision-making is rare. The obstacles to their participation are considerable, but not insurmountable. Across the city young people and their adult allies are working together to ensure that young voices are heard. Continue Reading>>

“A renewal effort has to be conceived as a process of building on the inherent social and economic values of the community. Neglecting these values through programs of massive clearance and redevelopment can disrupt an entire community.”

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.  Continue Reading>>

In mid-May, MAS hosted the third annual Livable Neighborhoods Program (LNP) at Hunter College. This year, the program, which offers free training to grassroots community-based planners and community board members, reached new heights having its highest turnout ever. Nearly 150 residents from all five boroughs joined us for a full day of training in topics ranging from community organizing to using data and maps to zoning.

Launched in 2007, with generous support from the Altman Foundation and the Mizhuo USA Foundation of the Mizuho Corporate Bank, the LNP continues to help New Yorkers access the tools and resources needed to effectively plan for their neighborhoods. To learn more about the Livable Neighborhoods Program, contact Sideya Sherman at ssherman@mas.org.

For the third and final installment of our podcast series of interviews with winners of the Yolanda Garcia Community Planner (YGCP) award, Eve Baron, Director of the MAS Planning Center, speaks with Yolanda Garcia’s daughter, Yolanda Gonzalez. Gonzalez succeeded her mother, for whom the award is named, as Executive Director of We Stay/Nos Quedamos, a community organization in the South Bronx that developed an alternative plan for Melrose Commons in the 1990s, and now oversees the plan’s implementation. Baron and Gonzalez discuss the plan’s creation, and the challenges and victories of community organizing in the South Bronx. The YGCP award jury is currently in the process of choosing the 2009 winner. This year’s award will be presented at MAS’ annual meeting in July.

The image above shows Yolanda Gonzalez, center, joined by her family and South Bronx elected officials, at a street renaming ceremony in honor of her mother, Yolanda Garcia in February of this year. Third Avenue between 156th and 157th Streets is now known as “Yolanda Garcia Way.”

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