Northattan

Knitty City is a tiny yarn store on the Upper West Side. Every Wednesday, one Washington Heights resident makes the trip south, to lead a merry band of male knitters.

No Parking bills itself as Washington Heights’ premier gay club. Wednesdays to Sundays, a mixed crowd flocks here to join the party.

With crime on the rise recently in Inwood, the community could soon have a new police team to patrol the neighborhood. The 34^th Precinct Community Council jumped the first hurdle toward sending more Impact Response Team (IRT) officers, police officers that respond to areas of high crime, to the northern section of the 34^th Precinct.

The council unanimously passed a resolution on Wednesday to request deployment of IRT officers to Inwood after police statistics showed that sending 60 additional IRT officers to a particular area of Washington Heights beginning in October decreased crime there.

“We need cops where there are serious crimes,” said George Espinal, president of the 34^th Precinct Community Council, after the council’s general meeting Wednesday. “We see them in the Heights, but we don’t see them in Inwood.”

The additional 60 IRT officers patrolled Washington Heights between West 181st Street and West 190th Street, from Broadway to Amsterdam, but with no additional patrols sent to Inwood.  The text of the resolution states that areas of Inwood between Dyckman Street and 10^th Avenue, and from Payson Avenue to West 218^th Street, were left “unguarded” with “a feeling of unsafe.”

Even though “there’s shootings, stabbings, there’s assaults,” the area “north of Dyckman didn’t get attention from the IRT,” Espinal said. The resolution seeks to change that. It would maintain “the current increased manpower and enforcement efforts” in Washington Heights through February 2011 and also deploy some of those 60 IRT officers to “sections in Inwood, North of Dyckman Street, in areas where recent car break-ins, muggings and other serious crime have taken place in the past 60 days.”

“We’re hoping that this will push for more officers” in addition to the current 60 members of the Impact Response Team that will now be shared between Washington Heights and Inwood. “This area is forgotten,” said Espinal, emphasizing that budget woes and the precinct’s reductions in manpower were to blame, not the current law enforcement efforts.

Crime in the 34^th Precinct increased almost 25 percent in the 28 days before Oct. 17, with robbery and car theft increasing by 300 percent and felony assault up by 900 percent in one week. There was no comparable spike last year. Now, according to the most recent police statistics for the first week in December, crime in the precinct has decreased overall by 30 percent.

The nonbinding resolution will be reviewed by Precinct Capt. Jose Navarro and then voted on in the precinct’s executive board meeting in January. Espinal said he is “very optimistic” about the resolution.

If passed, it would bring relief to community members like Nadia Pryadko, who was mugged while walking with her 19-month-old son near Inwood’s Indian Road Playground one November evening. Two teenage boys threatened her with a concealed object, ordering her to “Give me all you got and don’t scream!” Pryadko, who no longer enters the park alone after dark, said that the incident made her realize “that the park might be a nice feature of the neighborhood but it attracts crime.”

Another Inwood resident, Joseph Haas, said, “I have seen one or two plainclothes officers, squad cars, but it’s not going to stop crime. We need beat cops.”

Espinal said that beat cops “were taken away by the police powers downtown. Everybody talks about beat cops but we don’t have them anymore.”

Espinal said the resolution was a response to input from residents, including up to 50 weekly e-mails sent via the council’s website.

Although the 34^th Precinct has a population of 120,000 residents and more than 500 acres of parkland, it “has only four sectors each with one radio motor patrol (RMP) car for the entire precinct,” according to the resolution.

At Wednesday’s meeting, Capt. Navarro said, “This is a tough community and you keep me on my toes for sure.”

Northattan reporter Ingrid Rojas contributed to this story.

Along St. Nicholas Avenue and 181^st Street in Washington Heights, street vendors and their folding tables pack the sidewalks, offering everything from stuffed animals to designer watches, and pungent perfumes.

The vendors can satisfy almost any shopper’s needs, but not everyone is happy with their presence.  Recently, they have been targeted by local businesses that think there are too many in the neighborhood and that the stands have an unfair advantage.

“They’re selling items that we have, but cheaper,” said Alex Min, who manages a sports apparel store, FootCo, on the corner of 181^st Street and St. Nicholas Avenue.

For example, Min’s shop sells gloves for $20 and beanies for $10, but a vendor directly in front of FootCo sells similar items for $5 each.

New York City requires everyone selling merchandise such as clothing, dolls or watches to have a license.  But the city grants only 853 licenses to nonveterans and has a waitlist of thousands, forcing many vendors to operate illegally.

Without a permit, vendors escape paying a $200 yearly license fee and they don’t have to pay taxes. If they’re caught selling without a license, they can be arrested and their merchandise can be confiscated.

One unlicensed vendor, Zouhair Hoteite, has been selling hookahs and perfume in Washington Heights without a permit since 1988.  Last week he was arrested and this week he has already received two tickets.

“You’ve just got accept it,” Hoteite, who earlier in the year was fined $1,300, said.

“I can’t pay tickets, I don’t have money, my rent is $1,300 and I have a wife and kids,” he added.

Hoteite said he explained this to the judge, who dismissed the ticket.  But he now has two more to deal with and knows it will happen again.

Many street salespeople have flocked to Northern Manhattan, and as many as 40 operate near St. Nicholas Avenue, according to the Washington Heights Business Improvement District.

“I mean it’s really crazy to have three to four tables,” Nash Siddiquv said about the vendors in front of his 181^st Street T Mobile store.

The cluster of tables often block the building’s entrance, touching up against the windows and leaving a narrow path.

“There’s only two feet in between for people to walk,” Siddiquv said.  “People complain, they’re in front of the door and they can’t get in.”

He said he would like the number of vendors, or at least their tables, lowered in the future.  That wish may be closer to becoming reality.

The Washington Heights Business Improvement District, which oversees the area around 181^st Street from Amsterdam Avenue to Fort Washington Avenue, has been taking in feedback from residents and local merchants in hopes of creating a solution to the vendor problem early next year.

“It’s a very important issue for Washington Heights,” Angelina Ramirez, its executive director, said, adding that vendors, “put a strain for maintaining cleanliness on the sidewalk and they create traffic.”

All of the area’s vendors will be surveyed to see who is operating without a permit and Ramirez hopes to find a group to represent the street salespeople to create a “win-win” solution.

“The economy the way it is, we just don’t want to blindly take this livelihood away from people who make their money by selling,” Ramirez said.

New York City Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez, who represents Washington Heights, said he doesn’t want to outright get rid of vendors, but understands the complaints.

“We have to support our small businesses that pay taxes,” Rodriguez said.  “We need to be sure our streets are clean and pedestrians have the space to walk.”

Rodriguez said one possible solution would be to create a plaza specifically for street vendors where they wouldn’t clog the sidewalks.  The salespeople would be able to purchase a temporary permit allowing them to set up their tables for the day.

This would be modeled after the street vendor market on 175^th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue, which was created in 1994.

Rodriguez and Ramirez have been in talks with the Department of Transportation to explore the possibility of a new location.

But vendor Zouhair Hoteite said he would rather risk being arrested than selling in a plaza.

“There’s no money, people don’t go there,” Hoteite said.  “There’s no traffic.”

He said even if another plaza opened he would continue selling on St. Nicholas Avenue and 181^st Street.

The banners and billboards are purple. So are the t-shirts and hats worn by men who catch passersby outside MetroPCS stories on the business thoroughfares of Broadway and St. Nicholas Street in Washington Heights. And the purple seems to multiply every week. One local wag calls MetroPCS the neighborhood’s new McDonald’s: they’re inexpensive, and there is a store on nearly every block.

Across the nation, cell phone service providers AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-mobile are household names. But in parts of New York City like northern Manhattan and the Bronx, the fifth largest cell phone service provider in the United States is gaining ground on its better-known rivals.  For a fixed monthly rate, MetroPCS offers unlimited calls, texts and Internet service.  Service is purchased month-to-month, without the long-term contracts that other companies require. Like other providers cell phones are sold separately, but the no-contract policy is rapidly making MetroPCS an attractive option for people with tight budgets.

MetroPCS launched its first market in South Florida in 2002. Adam Bree, the New York region director of marketing for MetroPCS, says after South Florida and other successful starts in markets like Philadelphia and San Francisco, New York was the logical next step. The company came to the city just two years ago.

“It’s very straightforward and, it’s a service that was long overdue in a market like New York,” said Bree.

In New York, late payment fees and contract breaks from traditional cell phone service can present unexpected and costly expenses for residents in communities like Washington Heights, where many people work in low-income jobs and live pay check to pay check.

Near 161^st Street and Broadway, Saul Vega says the shop where he works, like most in the area, opened in February of last year.

“When we first started, not everybody knew what MetroPCS was all about. [Some] traveled back and forth between Miami and New York, so they kind of knew. But now, it’s all over the state and all over the city and every company knows who MetroPCS is now,” said Vega.

Today there are over a hundred locations that provide MetroPCS service in the five boroughs of New York.  The only other provider that comes close to that number is Verizon, with 60 locations.  The numbers include official stores, as well as third-party retailers, or independent storefronts that provide technical and billing support for the providers. A map on MetroPCS.com shows stores clustered mostly in Washington Heights, the Bronx and Jackson Heights, where most of the residents are immigrants from places like the Dominican Republic or Colombia.

For generations, calling home meant going to a bodega and purchasing a calling card, a tedious effort, with 10-digit pin numbers, automated messages and several options that must be selected before any ringing can occur. MetroPCS service replaces the need for calling cards, and thus appeals to a demographic that wants inexpensive, pay-as-you-go phone service to foreign countries.

“MetroPCS has their international rate plans absolutely for free for house phones, unlimited. So it has been a great service to the community,” said Ricky Balboa, one of the employees at a bustling store on West 181^st Street.

Sales pitch aside, Balboa is referring to a $60 fixed monthly plan that allows those away from their home to make international phone calls to land lines.

While appealing and a first of its kind, this service can be limiting. Cell phones are increasingly taking over in places like Africa and the Caribbean, where landline telephone service is poor.  So if a MetroPCS customer wants to reach loved ones with cell phones, calling cards may remain the preferred way to pay for international phone calls.

David Samberg, a spokesperson for Verizon Wireless in New York contends that pre-paid plans are nothing new. Though Verizon relies mostly on contracts, pre-paid services have always been an option for his customers. He says that the people who want pre-paid wireless services are those with little credit or those who prescribe to a cash culture, which aligns with some of the immigrant communities in Northern Manhattan and the Bronx.

Either way, MetroPCS has been remarkably profitable.

The Wall Street Journal reported in August that MetroPCS’ earnings nearly tripled in their second quarter report. MetroPCS added another 223,000 net customers.

Representatives from MetroPCS and Verizon say regional numbers are unavailable, but according to their company filings, MetroPCS has about 8 million customers in the United States, in comparison to Verizon’s 90 million.

The numbers put the local hype into perspective: MetroPCS still has a long way to go.

For nearly every famous park in New York City, there’s a powerful and wealthy organization behind it, like the Central Park Conservancy in Manhattan and the Prospect Park Alliance in Brooklyn. Other lesser-known parks in northern Manhattan, however, are not far behind, thanks to the efforts of the New York Restoration Project, a thriving nonprofit organization dedicated to restoring parks and community gardens in underserved areas across New York City.

The New York Restoration Project is the brainchild of Bette Midler, or the Divine Miss M, as her fans call her, an award-winning actress and singer known for hit songs like “Wind Beneath My Wings.” After a long career in California, Midler settled back in New York City. But once here, she was appalled to see the amount of trash in public areas, to the point of stopping her car to pick it up. Using her canyon clean-up experience with the California Environmental Program, Midler started recruiting friends and family to remove trash from Fort Tryon and Fort Washington parks. These grassroots efforts eventually led Midler to start the New York Restoration Project in 1995.

“We think of ourselves as a conservancy for parks that don’t have the resources that other parks have,” says Amy Gavaris, NYRP’s executive vice president, who has been with the foundation since its inception. “That’s the role that we fill in.”

To date NYRP has transformed 55 community gardens, removed 2,000 tons of garbage from city parks and planted thousands of trees as part of its partnership with the City of New York to plant one million trees by 2017. With a staff of just over 50 people plus over 2,000 volunteers, NYRP runs educational, recreational and environmental programs in the five boroughs. In northern Manhattan, it has played a major role in the revitalization of four parks: Fort Tryon, Fort Washington, Highbridge and Swindler Cove Parks.

NYRP uses a mix of funding for this purpose, including corporate and individual donations and two annual fundraisers through which it raised $11.2 million in the last year alone, despite the recession. Another source of funding comes from the New Leaf, a charming restaurant set amidst Fort Tryon’s lush vegetation in a restored 1930’s stone house.

But NYRP’s crown jewel achievement is the restoration of Swindler Cove Park in Washington Heights along the Harlem River. In collaboration with the city Parks Department, the New York State Department of Transportation and NYRP, the park was transformed from an illegal dumping ground into a flourishing five-acre park. NYRP pitched in 3 percent of the total renovation costs that a 2004 article in the New York Daily News estimated at  $10 million. One of the park’s highlights, the floating Peter Jay Sharp Boathouse, for use by area rowing teams, is the first community boathouse on the Harlem River in 100 years, according to NYRP’s website.

Currently NYRP has a management contract with Parks Department for Swindler Cove Park’s maintenance — a sign of confidence in NYRP’s work. Adrian Benepe, the parks commissioner, said: “Public-private partnerships are one effective way to engage New Yorkers in the life of their neighborhood parks and community gardens, and we are pleased to have a partner in New York Restoration Project. NYRP has helped to galvanize community volunteers to clean up and bring life back to gardens that have fallen by the wayside.”

Pat Courtney, who has worked as a volunteer at Isham Park in Inwood, says the boathouse project brought attention to the much-neglected waterfront, raising the bar for the community in terms of quality and integrity. “Washington Heights and Inwood already have some of the best parkland in New York City,” says Courtney, “and should have commensurate waterfront access. NYRP has been absolutely critical in the process of providing it to date.”

Another highlight in NYRP’s work was the transformation of Highbridge Park, just south of Swindler Cove Park along the Harlem River. Working in partnership with the Parks Department, together they turned this neglected park from a dangerous, drug-infested place, littered with abandoned cars and thousands of tires, into a 119-acre park with manicured pathways and gardens. While the Parks Department invested millions of dollars in capital development, NYRP contributed with the removal of tons of trash and planting native species.

Millie Seubert has run the volunteer group “Friends of Highbridge Park” since 1999 and she’s witnessed the park’s transformation. “NYRP was key in turning the tide in the restoration of Highbridge Park,” Seubert says. “They came in with a lot of resources, and above all they were focused and committed.”

For her part, Midler continues to be actively involved in NYRP’s activities as an advocate and spokeswoman. However, like many nonprofits, NYRP has been hit by tough economic times. Gavaris says “there are programs that we’ve had to put on hold, but we were fortunate, we didn’t have any layoffs.” Gavaris expects the organization to be expanding its programs again in 2012.

Gavaris says she doesn’t measure NYRP’s success by the endowment’s size, but by the community’s engagement. “I think we’ve had a significant impact,” says Gavaris, and with the city budget cuts announced recently NYPR expects to be doing much more work in the near future.

This article has been corrected. NYRP doesn’t receive an annual fee from Parks Department for Swindler Cove Park’s maintenance. Also, the transformation of Highbridge Park was carried out in partnership with the Parks Department.

Merchants at the “Off the Map” holiday market celebrated their neighborhoods with distinctively uptown products like limited edition “Inwood Hill Park” poster prints signed by the artist, original photography with Northern Manhattan as its subject and T-shirts with scribbled neighborhood slogans.

This first annual market on Saturday afternoon at Inwood’s Bread and Yoga studio, just steps from the 207^th Street subway station, was the first time that small business owners and artists in Inwood and Washington Heights came together to showcase their talent.

A steady stream of neighbors stopped in to support 14 local artists and small business owners and to peruse tables of eclectic handmade goods, from all-natural, vanilla-scented Play-Doh to a holiday wreath made from the pages of a book.

The market was sponsored by the newly formed Inwood Merchant Association and organized by Leopold Vasquez, artist M. Tony Peralta and Bread and Yoga director Marcela Xavier. Vasquez, who founded The Sound of Art, said the idea behind the market and the Inwood Merchant Association, which he also helped start, is “getting small, local businesses together as a unit” to make a difference in Inwood and Washington Heights. “People have tried to start one before,” Vasquez said, but always without success. He attributes the Inwood Merchant Association’s success to the support of the Audubon Partnership.

Other projects aimed at supporting local businesses, like Small Business Saturday last month, have also fallen short in Inwood and Washington Heights. “The community is in dire need of this, so we just had to get it jumping off,” Vasquez said.

“It had a good community feel,” Jocelyn Gottschalk, who sold leather purses and bracelets, said of the market. “And it was also good for my business,” she said, noting that she sold far more than she usually does at farmers markets.

At events like the “Off the Map” market, Inwood feels more like a small town than a New York City neighborhood. And Inwood’s proud of it.

“It’s a hidden treasure,” said Amanda Hall-Smith, a dog trainer and walker. Referring to her fellow young entrepreneurs in Inwood, Hall-Smith said, “We’re all trying to help each other make it.”

Gottschalk greeted friends and neighbors at her table and said, “For me, it was nice to see people that I know.”

The market’s name is a reference to Inwood frequently being left off city tourist maps. “It’s called ‘Off the Map’ because we are not the Bronx,” Vasquez said. “We are not Harlem. And sometimes, we’re not even Manhattan!”

But while being “off the map” enhances Inwood’s small-town feel, it also means that some residents think they have to venture out of the neighborhood for their holiday shopping. Vasquez thanked visitors for instead “supporting your local business here” and for not showing up with shopping bags from downtown retailers.

Anina Young owns Brazen Lingerie at 253 Dyckman St., where she sells sassy loungewear, including thongs that read “Uptown’s finest.” She joked with market visitors that, “I don’t want Chelsea girls wearing that. Or Midtown” girls, either.

Young says people have pre-conceived notions about her shop “because it’s on Dyckman Street and it’s in Inwood.” When customers tell her that her store is not what they expected from a lingerie shop in Inwood, she replies, “You thought it was a hoochie-momma store, didn’t you?” Young says “the block has been changing and changing” with a burgeoning restaurant and retail scene.

In keeping with the neighborhood theme, artist Sasha Schwartz, who owns the Scribble Art Workshop, offered a canvas bag featuring Inwood staples like Inwood Hill Park and the Dyckman Street subway station. “There are so many artists in this neighborhood and it’s great to get them all together,” Schwartz said.

Inwood resident Jessica Wells-Hasan left the market with armfuls of handmade goodies, including multicolored, striped Hula-Hoops, custom-made canvas totes and limited-edition prints. Wells-Hasan said, “It’s so much better knowing money is staying in the neighborhood and going to your friends and neighbors,” rather than big brand stores.

The community support reached beyond the four walls of the Bread and Yoga studio to Inwood’s vibrant online community. Inwood resident Annie Szymanski posted on Twitter after the market that: “this neighborhood has truly made me understand how community makes a home.”

The Off the Map Market will return to Bread and Yoga next Saturday from 1:30 to 9 p.m. and again on Dec. 18 at the Audubon Partnership Headquarters from 3 to 9 p.m.

Story updated Dec. 8 to include more information about the Audubon Partnership.

Pat McCullough has been serving the Washington Heights and Inwood communities for over 25 years. At 77, she seems like an unlikely housing crusader. But when she gets a delinquent landlord on the phone, watch out.

A Northern Manhattan cab driver narrowly avoided deportation following his arrest last week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, based on a 28-year-old gun possession conviction.

The cabby, Eligio Valerio, stood closely by his daughter, Elibany, as Assemblyman Adriano Espaillat, Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez and the former Commissioner of Immigrant Affairs, Guillermo Linares, addressed a small crowd gathered outside of 26 Federal Plaza immediately following his release. Rodriguez gave a clear and ardent plea.

“ICE is out of control,” said Rodriguez, “that’s the bottom line.”

Early last Wednesday, as Valerio picked up his first two passengers, he received a call from his wife that ICE agents at their home asked to meet him in front of the 33^rd Precinct in Washington Heights. When Valerio met them there, they told him that he was being arrested for something in his past.

In 1982, when Valerio owned a bodega in Washington Heights, he was arrested for possession of an unregistered gun that he says used for protection while he ran his store. But Valerio, who emigrated from the Dominican Republic in 1979 and has a green card, completed three years of probation and has maintained a clean record since then. So the ICE arrest was a complete surprise.

The ICE officials told Valerio he was not eligible for bail or a hearing at the time of his arrest.

Valerio’s daughter, Elibany Valerio, a paralegal, told the lawyers at the firm where she worked, who then were in touch with local officials. Together the law firm and local officials put pressure on ICE for a prompt hearing on Wednesday. Valerio was then released on $2,500 bond.

At the press conference Wednesday, Valerio was solemn but subtly demonstrated gestures of affection toward his daughter, after what was a traumatic week for the family.

Valerio, who took the microphone briefly, thanked the local officials in his native Spanish and the community for their support. His daughter stepped in afterward to translate.

“My father thanks everybody in the community,” said Elibany Valerio.

Just days earlier, she had stood before the press pleading for her father’s release.  Tearful and frightened, she told reporters at a press conference along side Councilman Rodriguez how her father had been detained. She was confused and frustrated because he was a legal resident, who for nearly 30 years had paid his taxes.

“Even the judge who saw him Wednesday was confused. He asked ‘Why is here here?’” said Rodriguez.

Valerio’s lawyer did not permit him to comment further, and Rodriguez said he didn’t know what had prompted ICE to arrest Valerio. ICE has declined to comment on the reason for detaining Valerio.

Valerio’s arrest comes on the after of a recent surge by federal government to increase deportations with a program called Secure Communities.

The ICE website says that Secure Communities is a “comprehensive strategy to improve and modernize the identification and removal of criminal aliens from the United States.” They work with local authorities to obtain fingerprints and compare them with their records.

ICE emphasizes its  intent to deport the worst of the worst, those with crimes like murder or rape on their record. The reality, however, is that  people like Valerio, with minor nonviolent offenses, can get caught in the system.

Advocates and local officials like Rodriguez, Espaillat and Linares are calling on Gov. David Patterson to withdraw New York from participation with Secure Communities because of the controversial effects.

Some of those biggest issues are the dismal conditions for immigrants in prison awaiting deportation. Valerio describes the location as hell on earth.

“To make a phone call to one person in your family was incredibly difficult. They have like 20 there but to make a call is as hard as reaching the sky with your own two hands,” said Valerio, with translation from his daughter.

Elibany Valerio recognized immediately that her father’s rights had been violated. But not everyone has such an advocate.

“What about the average citizen, what about the young man Mr. Valerio met inside who is a teenager, a Mexican teenager, he knows how to speak both English and Spanish, educated here,” said Rodriguez, “He told Mr. Valerio that all he was doing was graffiti. Because of that, he will be deported next week to Mexico.”

Other concerns about Secure Communities are that for fear of being deported, many undocumented residents will forgo reporting serious crimes or accidents in their neighborhoods.

Valerio escaped deportation this week, but he is due to return to this detention center for a second court appearance with the judge in January. While that looms ahead, Rodriguez was sanguine.

“Yeah, ICE took his green card, but we are confident,” said Rodriguez, “It could be that this is a mistake, but if it’s a mistake they have to fix it.”

As the press conference ended, a local advocacy group, Make the Road, chanted “familia, familia unidad jamas sera vencida,” meaning that a family together will never be torn apart. For now, Valerio is happy to be reunited with daughter and family, especially now as his daughter awaits the birth of her child next month.