SoiferI VtP Annotation: Reading Places

Members of the Columbia University community and the government seek to examine gentrification and the various effects it has on the people residing in West Harlem. For example, the District Attorney of New York County has submitted a Criminal Justice Investment Initiative, specifically a proposal for a West Harlem Community Reentry Project for those formerly incarcerated. Council members and other governmental officials will attend general assembly meetings at Grant Houses to learn about the issues that matter to the residents (whether they act on them or not is a different story). Social work students have attended those same meetings to determine how they can be of service to the residents. Newspaper articles are being written about the changing social fabric and physical landscape of the Manhattanville area, and the effects it has had on the community there--some are more critical than others, taking the stance generally of either supporting the “revitalization” of the neighborhood, or else calling into question the methods by which Columbia obtained the land in Manhattanville to engage in its project. Nonprofit organizations such as Community Voices Heard are critical of expansion projects such as the Manhattanville Expansion, particularly the displacement it will cause and has caused low-income residents. They are particularly baffled by the notion that such institutions as Columbia deem themselves to be “liberal” and purport to care for the community of West Harlem, and yet all the same engage in hegemonic and coercive behavior.Columbia University, Morningside Area Alliance, Community Voices Heard, West Harlem Development Corporation, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Dear Mama Coffee, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, and Steep Rock Bouldering gym, as just some examples. Educational institutions, religious institutions, and high-end coffee shops, law firms, and gyms all have stakes in the success of the Manhattanville Expansion. Columbia is invested in not only maintaining the buildings in the Expansion, but managing and controlling up to the waterfront and through to portions of West Harlem. Columbia University also recognizes itself as a “global” institution, but advertises on its website the incorporation of the West Harlem community and diversity into the fold of the campus. What this actually looks like, and whether it comes to fruition, is another story. Columbia claims that it is bringing together a diverse array of academic fields to address the “great questions facing our society.” What are these “great questions,” and what implications do they have for the multiple geographic scales implicated in the Expansion? How do each of these organizations theorize about changes in the neighborhood? What is the history of racialized and classed geopolitics in the neighborhood, and how does it inform the present moment? How do organizations challenge or else play into and feed these geopolitics?The New York City Housing Authority is a prominent actor in tandem with the residents of housing developments. There is a constant push and pull between fulfilling the needs of residents and exclamations that there is not enough funding to support the repairs housing desperately needs due to aging. Local politicians are also participating by providing residents with options such as participant budgeting and spaces to voice their concerns. However, participant budgeting and the Community Benefits Agreement both provide enough funding for such projects as renovating playgrounds and planting trees, as opposed to the lump sum residents affirm are needed to address the real damage to the housing. The office of the Public Advocate also attempts to contribute to the discussion, posting annually lists of the worst landlords in New York City so as to bring attention to those who are attempting to bully low-income residents out of housing in New York City so as to resell the housing at infinitely higher prices. Meanwhile, Columbia University does not engage in dialogue around lack of funding for public/affordable housing and gentrifying practices by themselves and other landlords, choosing to focus instead on the “global” and how their efforts will contribute to the “greater good,” the likes of which appears to outright ignore the influences of late industrialism.