Ahead of the one-year anniversary of the city’s deadliest fire in decades, Bronx Councilman Ritchie Torres called for a new law to help residents displaced by a fire find new homes in the same neighborhood.

“Even in the worst of a fire, the loss of one’s home should never mean the loss of your community,” Torres said at a news conference in front of the boarded-up Belmont building that went up in flames last year. “It should be the public policy priority of the city of New York to keep people firmly rooted in their neighborhoods and their local support structure.”

The Dec. 28, 2017 fire at 2363 Prospect Ave. killed 12 people – including four children – and left dozens of tenants in the 25-unit building without homes. Torres’s new bill would require the city’s Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) agency to help relocate displaced persons to vacant affordable housing nearby.

Father Eric Cruz, the Bronx Regional Director for the Archdiocese of New York’s charitable arm, emphasized the impact displacement can have on children in particular.

“Going to another borough and trying to help navigate that family to transport their child to a school where they once were… [is] a stress point that is detrimental,” Cruz said. “Why in god’s name are we looking to just move them to another place and chalk it up to market availability?”

The bill, co-sponsored by Brooklyn Councilman Robert E. Cornegy, Jr., would mandate HPD work with FDNY to maintain a database of vacant, city-financed apartments in each council district. In the event of a fire or equally disruptive tragedy, HPD would then use these lists to help place impacted individuals and families in housing as close to their original home as possible.

Currently, HPD works with the American National Red Cross to place people hotels for 2-3 nights. In the following days and weeks, HPD works with individuals and families to find them appropriate housing. According to Torres, the housing that is found is not always the most convenient for displaced residents.

“In the face of tragedy, the City steps up to provide services to those in need,” an HPD spokesperson said in a statement. “HPD partners with the Red Cross to respond to emergencies and offers housing services for those who are forced out of their homes due to fire. We look forward to reviewing this legislation.”

Torres’ bill comes at a time when there is a shortage of affordable housing despite a surplus of vacant market rate housing citywide.

Joe Cicciu, the executive director of the Belmont Arthur Avenue Local Development Corporation, worked with Torres to find nearby housing for families in the aftermath of the fire. Cicciu echoed Torres position that HPD needs to step in when it comes to tragedies like the Belmont fire.

“HPD means well, but it doesn’t understand when you have a crisis you have to put aside the various rules and regulations and deal with the immediate problems that exist,” Cicciu said. “[The city needs to] understand the necessity of providing affordable housing immediately if we have the resources available at the time that it occurs.”

Regardless, Cicciu said he was happy to help and would do it again.

“We want to make all of our resources available in a crisis mode,” Cicciu said. “We’re happy to have done it this time. Hopefully we won’t have to do it again, but we live in the Bronx, in the city of New York a crisis appears every day.”

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Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.