NY Sun Columnist Alicia Colon writes an excellent column today on the injustice occurring at the
Bronx Terminal Market:
The city may claim that the Bronx Terminal Market was an eyesore and the area was neglected and undeveloped. That is true. The former owner didn't do its job. But there should have been a fair process in place to negotiate improvements, a process that did not involve eviction without adequate relocation for the remaining wholesalers. Instead of assisting the Bronx wholesalers in relocating to a suitable locale, it has in essence told them: "Here's some money, now get out of town."
Colon sees the Terminal Market as emblematic of Mayor’s Bloomberg’s misguided economic development policy:
This mayor from Massachusetts doesn't understand or care that what makes New York great is its people, not its buildings. I may not have been able to speak out about what happened to La Marqueta in Spanish Harlem, but I'm not going to let the Bronx Terminal Market fade away without making a plea for the tenants being forced out thanks to a sweetheart deal with pals of the Bloomberg administration.
She also exhorts the Democratic candidates for mayor to get involved:
Isn't the Democratic Party supposed to be concerned with the plight of minorities? Isn't that supposed to be why members of minority groups vote overwhelmingly Democratic? Then why, pray tell, hasn't Gifford Miller, Fernando Ferrer, or one of the others made a brouhaha about the minority vendors being evicted, in a highly questionable deal reeking of conflict of interest?
We also liked Colon’s mentioning of our website’s compilation of
terminal market articles.
