🏛️ Our Values, 🗑️ Finalizing Prep for the Fulton Trash Meeting Next Week

🌟 Author’s Note

Hello to our 54 advocates at the Better Block Project!

We’re only ⏲️ 10 days away from our event to advocate for a Cleaner Fulton Street on July 9th 🧹 at St. Peter Claver Church. We have 10 RSVPs so far and our goal is to gather as large a group as we can to advocate with the City Council and DSNY for more resources to keep the street clean. You can RSVP here and I’ll be passing out fliers this week on Fulton Street to spread the word. Please make every effort to attend next week. The more individuals who can make the meeting, the more likely we’ll drive real action from the city 💪 

🏛️ The Values that Guide Us at The Better Block Project

This week I was in Istanbul for a family wedding, so I wanted to take the opportunity to write an update that was more reflective on who we are at the Better Block Project. I’ve decided to explain in more depth what our values are as an organization. Values set the tone for how we operate. These initial values are informed by what I’ve seen successful in my career in startups and technology and what I’ve learned working more closely with the city. My hope is the values we model will drive better outcomes for the Better Block Project and can become a guide for how civic engagement is done across other organizations.

🏇 Getting things done, fast

Our first value is getting things done, fast. The Better Block Project is committed to truly solving problems for our neighbors, and solving them quickly. One of the things I have noticed since I’ve started my advocacy work is even after intervention from the city, the problems they have attempted to solve still remain unsolved. At 1105 Fulton, despite multiple enforcement actions from the Department of Buildings, the property still remains vacant and out of compliance. In Williamsburg, despite a long threaded engagement with city council, the Wasp’s Nest is still sitting in the tree outside of the small business. This is the unfortunate nature of many quality of life issues in New York today. They remain unaddressed.

We seek to change that at the Better Block Project. We aim to be an organization that truly solves problems, no matter how long it takes. It’s not enough for us to put in a lot of effort, it’s also a requirement that we solve the problem. In addition to that, speed matters. Our neighbors walk by these problems every day. They experience broken sidewalks, vacant properties or trash on the street each morning on their commutes, so these problems are urgent for them. As a result, we have to act with the same urgency in order to fix them.

🤝 Building community, with all of our neighbors

Our second value is building community, with all of our neighbors. More than a year ago, when I started on the journey to improve 1105 Fulton, one unexpected, but amazing outcome of the effort was the relationships I was able to build with my neighbors. In New York, a city known for not knowing who lives next door to you 😳, it was incredible to walk down the street and see Andrea, Meredith, Patricia, Andrew and others I had met throughout our advocacy work. Everyone lived on my block and shared a passion for improving it. This blossomed into monthly meetings at my home, an incredible BBQ, and a wealth of new people I am grateful to call friends.

The Better Block Project is open to everyone, regardless of background, political affiliation or how long you have lived in the neighborhood. The only requirement is that you care deeply about building a better New York city.

It’s this community that will give us more power to advocate for issues we care about and will create the neighborhood we all want to live in.

🔭 Dreaming big, and taking consistent steps to get there

Our last value is dreaming big, and taking consistent steps to get there. I believe in a version of Brooklyn where there are no more vacant properties. Every street is immaculately clean, and when we reach out to our public officials, we always hear back quickly and thoughtfully. We’re not in that world today, but it’s important we set that target so we have something inspiring to build towards. New York has achieved so many incredible feats in its history, from the Brooklyn Bridge to parks like Little Island and more. The truth is, we actually can create the version of the city we want, but we have to believe it can exist first.

The only way to achieve those goals is through consistency and perseverance. It takes a long time to solve the problems we seek to solve (Barry Diller almost gave up on Little Island). The city moves slowly and often our first solution isn’t the right one, so we have to keep taking steps day in and day out, like hiking a mountain 🏔️ . This has proven effective, as we’ve seen perseverance enable us to make headway with elected officials, get more access to agencies like HPD and DOB and receive media coverage of our efforts. If we stay consistent, with enough time, there is no doubt we will be successful in what we’re aiming to achieve.

These are the values of the Better Block Project. We’ll evolve them over time as we grow but in the meantime I hope they serve as a guide for our work, and increase our chances at being successful in building an even better New York city.

⏳ Where we are on the other problems we’re working on

Despite the week away from NYC, we still were able to push forward some of the problems we’re working on, see updates below:

• 🏠️ Protecting Residents from Property Tax Reform: We heard back from the offices of Senator Gounardes, and are now working to set up time with them to discuss his views on property tax reform and our advocacy for a circuit breaker that protects both low and middle income residents

• 🐝 Removing the Wasp’s Nest in Williamsburg: We finally heard back from the City Council on the Wasp Nest, but unfortunately the guidance they provided didn’t apply to the city tree we are working with 🤦 . While this is frustrating, Remi and I have decided to pursue taking the Wasp’s nest down this week. We’re calling exterminators on Monday and hope to have the Wasp nest down by end of week 💪 

• 🗑️ Cleaning up the Trash on Fulton Street: We’ve grown our RSVP list for our July 9th event to advocate for a cleaner Fulton Street. This coming week, we plan to pass out fliers on Fulton to raise awareness for the event, contact ACE to get more details on how they’re assisting with the trash situation, continue our 311 blitz ⚡️ and solidify the programming for the event

• 🏢 Improving Vacant Properties on Fulton, Jefferson and Macon: We heard back from HPD and are aiming to schedule time the week of July 21st to tour the properties to see if they qualify for the Zombie Homes initiative. We’ll also be diving into 73 and 75 Macon Street this week to better understand the history of these properties to see what options we have to revitalize them

🤝 How you can help

1. If you have any feedback on the values above, I’d love to hear it

2. As a reminder, share the July 9th Fulton Community Trash Event with anyone you know impacted by the issue, and make plans to attend!

3. If you think you can help out on any of the problems above, just reply to this update. This community is a large part of the power we have to make a difference

That’s all for this week’s update. If you like what we’re doing here, share betterblockproject.com with other community members you know who are looking to drive change in Brooklyn. This coming week, I’m back in New York so expect movement on all of the problems we’re aiming to solve.

See you next week,

David