By Adam Kramer
What are you going to do to help us was the cry from southeast Queens residents last Thursday as they addressed public officials at the Wayanda Civic Association’s town hall meeting.
The event, held in the basement of the Hollis Congressional Church at 211-04 Hollis Ave. in Queens Village, brought together more than 150 people with concerns about their neighborhoods, City Councilman Archie Spigner (D-St. Albans), civic leaders and nine public officials representing different city departments. The agencies ranged from the Department of Sanitation to the Department of Health and from the Department of Transportation to the Department of Buildings.
“This is the ideal opportunity for members of our community to point out to city officials problems in their communities, which have remained unsolved,” said Peter Richards, president of the Wayanda Civic Association. “Our last town hall meeting was held in April 1999. Many issues raised then have been unresolved to this day.”
The southeast Queens neighborhoods represented at the meeting were Queens Village, St. Albans, Hollis, Rosedale, Laurelton and Cambria Heights.
Richards cited the community’s high incidence of felony crimes; illegal conversion of single family homes, which plagues all of the borough; the amount of time it takes the police to respond to emergency calls; street cleaning; and the need for more traffic signals as a few of the residents concerns.
The event was the fifth town hall meeting organized by the civic association, said Leroy Comrie, who is running for the City Council and hopes to succeed Spigner, who must step down because of term limits. He said it was important to bring the agencies to the meeting to listen to the community’s concerns.
He said Spigner’s office has been trying to put together similar meeting with other civic associations, but it is difficult to get the agencies to come out to the communities.
“I wanted to listen to some of the concerns raised by the residents,” said Earl Simons, another candidate for Spigner’s seat and vice president of the Cambria Heights Civic Association. “The reported problems have existed for years. I have listened to people’s concerns and issues and I will make sure as the local councilman from District 27 to address them.”
He highlighted some of the persisting problems, such as a man who spoke at the meeting about the lack of curbs on his street for the past 15 years and the 11 applications filled out by a woman before she got a response from the city on a dumping problem.
“Fifteen years ago the Department of Transportation came onto my street to repave it. The big problem was no one came in and put in curbs,” said the man, who lives on 212th Street between Hollis Avenue and 99th Avenue. “The USA Car Wash is on Jamaica Avenue and we have runoff. This would be a big thing to repave the curbs.”
Ronald Bramsen, the DOT’s representative, said the lack of curbs on streets is a citywide issue and the department has just started an in-house curb program. But at the moment there are only two crews working throughout the city.
An angry and exasperated Gwen Williams, representing the residents of 227th Street between 108th Avenue and 109th Avenue, voiced neighbors’ concern about a group home being built on their block. Members of the community went to Borough Hall but were directed to the community board.
She said she tried to set up a meeting with Sue Noreika, president of Community Board 13, but was told to go to the town hall meeting instead.
After attending the Wayanda Civic meeting, Williams said “there are still no answers” and she wanted to know what her block’s next move should be.
Residents also spoke of their anxieties about the West Nile virus and the chemical spraying that the city has used to kill mosquitoes, which transmit the disease. West Nile hit the borough two years ago and over the past two summers several people have died.
Jessica Morris, the Department of Health’s representative, stressed the need for every city resident to look at the agency’s web site, which has all the information relating to the disease.
“We want to get rid of the larva. Our goal is to do preventative work,” she said. “Your responsibility is to get rid of standing water.”
Reach reporter Adam Kramer by e-mail at Timesledgr@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 157.
