PATCH
By Nick Garber
Chronically-filthy blocks of 125th Street look cleaner than ever thanks to a city cleanup program — but new cuts may mean "going backwards."
EAST HARLEM, NY — A cleanup effort that has transformed the once-filthy blocks along 125th Street near the Metro-North train tracks has come to an end, as the demise of a citywide sanitation program threatens to undo what residents say has been the corridor's biggest improvement in years.
A series of blocks long strewn with trash, drug paraphernalia, and sometimes human waste have been spruced up, power-washed and given some much-needed love. The new look is thanks largely to the City Cleanup Corps: a New Deal-style pandemic initiative fueled by federal stimulus money, in which the city hired thousands of workers to wipe away graffiti, pick up rubbish, plant flowers, and more.
Now, as those federal funds dry up, the city says it is planning a smaller cleanup program to replace the Cleanup Corps — but Harlem residents fear that months of progress will still be undone.
In East Harlem, up to 40 Cleanup Corps workers have posted up since October on five blocks surrounding the intersection of 125th Street and Lexington Avenue, spending seven days a week cleaning the chronically-grimy thoroughfare — and collecting up to 350 trash bags each week.
The difference, residents say, has been enormous.
"It’s been such a blessing to see," said Carey King, director of the nonprofiit Uptown Grand Central, which has worked to beautify the 125th Street corridor since 2016. The dozens of Cleanup Corps workers have supplemented a far smaller team of just five sanitation workers that Uptown Grand Central has employed since 2019.
But the transformation may be short-lived: the Cleanup Corps program ended Thursday, and neighborhood leaders have been told that the city's new budget lacks any funding to continue the program.
"I cannot imagine going backwards," King said. "For decades, everybody has thought that East 125th Street could never be clean — it was just an impossible task."
Pleas to the mayor
In a desperate plea to keep the Corps, Uptown Grand Central asked Harlemites to fill out a survey describing the changes they've seen on 125th Street in the past eight months. The response was overwhelming: in a document that Uptown Grand Central has sent to the mayor's office, dozens of residents credited the cleanups with ushering in positive change.
"125th Street is one of the dirtiest streets in the entire city and the Clean Team has made it look the way streets should look," one resident wrote. "Without the Clean Team, I'm certain the street will go back to being a strong disincentive to take part in East Harlem life."
Reached for comment, a spokesperson for the mayor's office insisted that cleaning services on 125th Street would continue in the Corps' absence through a new program — though few details were offered.
"Once the one-time federal funding for the City Cleanup Corps expired, the administration reimagined a targeted program that we are funding to provide supplemental cleaning services in the neighborhoods that need them most," the City Hall spokesperson said.
"We can assure all those concerned that supplemental cleaning services on 125th Street will continue as we finalize the details of the new program. We appreciate the community’s input and look forward to receiving more as we identify the right neighborhoods for these services."
King guessed that the spokesperson was referring to a far smaller program under the auspices of the Doe Fund, which offers a few hours' worth of cleaning at certain sites around the city each week. While their help would be appreciated, King said it would be no match for the heavily-trafficked 125th Street corridor.
"Our lesson is that we need a huge workforce and a consistent presence to keep it really clean," King said.
"It's been decades"
Mayor Adams also faces political pressure to keep the cleanups: in addition to the Harlem residents, Community Board 11 and East Harlem Councilmember Diana Ayala penned their own letters to the mayor echoing the calls to keep cleaning 125th.
"Since the start of the CCC workers, longtime residents and small business owners alike have commented that it’s been decades since they’ve seen East 125th Street looking so clean and welcoming," Ayala wrote in her June 14 letter, which was shared with Patch.
Since taking office in January, Adams has pledged to be responsive to mounting safety concerns on the 125th Street corridor, taking a tour of the area with U.S. Rep. Adriano Espaillat in February.
Sanitation issues have long plagued 125th Street, stemming in part from crises of opioid use and homelessness. At least some of the people who consume drugs on the corridor live at the men's shelter on Wards Island and come to East Harlem via the M35 bus, local leaders have said.
Some of the existing Cleanup Corps programming will be absorbed into existing city agencies, city officials told community groups in a conference call on Thursday — though much of its work will no longer be done past June 30.
To date, the Cleanup Corps has hired 13,025 people, according to slides from the conference call shared with Patch — more than the initial goal of 10,000 workers set last yaer by then-Mayor Bill de Blasio.