A CHILD GREETS a costumed character along Morris Park Avenue during the annual Bronx Columbus Day Parade, New York State’s second largest parade honoring Christopher Columbus.
Photo by David Greene
If one were to compare the Bronx to the human anatomy, Morris Park would be located where the heart should be. For years, residents of this middle class neighborhood enjoyed a quality of life only matched by Riverdale or Pelham Bay. But residents today worry the quality of life they have enjoyed for decades is quickly deteriorating, and they’re fighting back.
Made up mostly of tree-lined streets and private homes, many residents enjoy life without the alternate-side parking quandary that dominates the Bronx as homeowners clean the streets in front of their property. The community enjoys some of the best hospitals, schools, and restaurants in the borough, if not the city.
The neighborhood is named after John Albert Morris, who brought horse racing to the area, the Morris Park Racecourse, which held both the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes in 1890.
An 84-year-old resident who went by “Josephine” has lived in the community since “she was five years old.” Walking to the Big Deal Supermarket on Paulding Avenue, Josephine recalled raising her three now grown children in the area, enrolling them in Catholic school. These days, Josephine admits, “Catholic schools are too expensive,” claiming they run upwards of $600 a month. She compares it with the price she paid to enroll her oldest daughter to St. Francis Xavier on Lurting Avenue: $25 per year.
“Now, when my kids come back they say, ‘Mother, we see changes,’” said Josephine, adding, “They see it more than I do.”
In her lifetime, Josephine has watched Morris Park go from an Irish, German and Jewish community to predominantly Italian, indicative of the red-, white-, and green-colored paint (the colors of the Italian flag) emblazoned in some parts of the roadway on Morris Park Avenue. Josephine gets feisty when the discussion moves to today’s immigrants originating from India, Albania and Yemen.
“Some of the people are nice, but we’re getting smothered. Some don’t say ‘hello,’” Josephine said angrily. “I have no respect for someone who doesn’t learn the English language.”
Morris Park is not impervious to crime. It does happen, though the Morris Park Community Association, a non-profit neighborhood watch group founded three decades ago, mobilizes when it notices an uptick. At a recent town hall meeting on July 27, members handed a flier to guests reading, “We’re tired of being passive! It’s time to take our neighborhood back.”
At the same meeting, Captain Keith Walton, commanding officer of the 49th Precinct, which patrols Morris Park, reported burglaries, assaults, and thefts have led to a 17 percent crime increase. Residents were recently shocked as the heroin epidemic came to the community, claiming at least two overdoses at nearby Loreto Park.
Despite policy mandates and only 220 police officers to patrol 3.8 square miles that make up the 49th Precinct, where 140,000 residents now call home, Walton remained optimistic, calling Morris Park “a very safe community.”
“Obviously, we’re experiencing a spike in certain index crimes like burglary and grand larceny, but we were able to identify certain patterns and to arrest the individuals responsible,” said Walton.
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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.
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I’m a MP resident and I have lived here for 24 years. I have definitely seen changes in the area and they’re not for the best. A huge part of the problem are homeowners who rent to anything, such as the sfacim who rents his house to a Section 8 family of ghetto slobs from Hunts Points. They are ruining one street in particular. Add in the God damn recycle facility that Big Deal Supermarket must have and now we have numerous homeless or whatever the hell they are rummaging around the neighborhood, walking onto private property and creating one big disgusting mess that many residents are sick and tired of looking at.
Don’t get me wrong – MP is still one of the safer areas of the Bronx and NYC. But when I see these changes I have to wonder what the hell is wrong with those who sell their homes to anyone, rent to anything and the residents who are passive to let it all happen.
Enough already!
All it means is that your neighbors didn’t really care as much as they did. That said that complaint is everywhere. Many people from The Bronx – including Morris Park – fled to places like Rockland and Dutchess counties. The same problems they were complaining about starting to happen in their neighborhood has followed them into the suburbs. Same thing can be said for many parts of Florida.