East New York, Brooklyn

East New York is a primarily low to middle income neighborhood in the borough of Brooklyn in New York City. It was originally envisioned as an eastern counterpart to Manhattan, hence the name.

Related Topics:
Brooklyn - New York City - Manhattan

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East New York, with its declining manufacturing and industrial base, is economically depressed, which has created a host of socioeconomic problems, including widespread unemployment.

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Walter Thabit, a city planner for East New York, chronicled in his book, How East New York Became a Ghetto, the change in population from mostly working-class Italians and Jewish residents to impoverished residents, 86% of whom are of Puerto Rican and African-American descent. Thabit argues that landlords and real estate agents played a significant role in the downturn of the area. Puerto Ricans were moving in masses to New York City in the late 1950s, at a time when umemployment rates in Puerto Rico soared to 25 percent, and unfair import-export rates favouring the United States left Puerto Rico on the brink of poverty. Similarly, many African-Americans were migrating northward in the post-war era.

Related Topics:
City planner - Italians - Jewish - Puerto Rican - African-American - 1950s

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Once Black and Puerto Rican people moved into the neighborhood, landlords and real estate agents used scare tactics to encourage Italians and Jews to leave, citing that the "time to sell is now." At the same time, landlords were taking advantage of new residents by charging them high down payments and gouging them on rent payments. They would then evict tenants at the first possible opportunity, keeping the down payment to themselves.

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Thabit also describes how the construction of public housing projects in East New York further contributed to its decline, noting that many of the developments were built by corrupt managers and contractors. He argues that the city government largely ignored the community, when it could have helped turn it around.

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