We will present our petition at the CB7 full board meeting tonight. The meeting starts at 6:30 pm on Zoom. Here is the link to register for the meeting.
PLEASE, PLEASE, if you can, ATTEND THIS MEETING, raise your hand, and say you want this crosswalk protected BY LABOR DAY, NO LATER.
If you have a child attending one of the schools near the crosswalk, please say that. If you are one of the older children attending the ECFS school and can testify that you or your teachers have been in danger in our crosswalk, please say that. If you are a teacher and have been assaulted by a racing bike speeding thru our crosswalk while you and your class are in the crosswalk and the white safe-to-cross light is on, trying to get to safety on the other side, please say that. If you are a resident or a tourist and have been the victim of a near-miss in our crosswalk, or have been assaulted by a racing bike or other vehicle speeding thru, please say that. If you have actually been struck and/or injured by a vehicle speeding thru our crosswalk, please say that.
THIS IS OUR FIRST OPPORTUNITY TO TAKE A STAND PUBLICLY. PLEASE BE THERE AND MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD.
We are not on the agenda, so our chance to speak is at the end of the meeting. This will be quite a bit later than 6:30 pm, so even if you are very late to the meeting, you will probably still be able to add your voice. CB7 is a bureaucracy and they won't move quickly if we don't demand it in no uncertain terms.
As I write this, eleven days after starting our petition, over 340 people have signed it. These signatories are mostly parents and caregivers of children that attend schools at the YMCA and Ethical Culture Fieldston School (ECFS). They are the primary stakeholders. The petition has not been circulated on social media to my knowledge but has only been available thru posters plastered up at both sides of the crosswalk over West Drive in Central Park at the 63rd Street entrance or handed out to parents and caregivers waiting to pick up their kids from these schools. So it is likely that the vast majority of signatories are parents, caregivers, teachers, and people who use our crosswalk every day.
Over 270 (80%) of these signatures are from New York and New Jersey. Almost 100 (30%) are from the 10023 zip code alone. This is the zip code of the YMCA and ECFS as well as the crosswalk itself.
We believe our best approach is to get this in front of CB7 before we go to NYC Councilmember Gale A. Brewer so we can answer the inevitable question in the affirmative when Brewer's office asks if we've been in touch with Community Board 7. Labor Day is an aggressive deadline to make this crosswalk safe for our kids from the YMCA and ECFS but the political headwinds are blowing in our favor. We can get this done but we have to be resolute and well-organized.
YOUR PUBLIC AND VOCAL SUPPORT IS CRUCIAL TO AVOIDING DELAYS.
Today's screengrab is an ECFS teacher being assaulted last week by a racing bicycle forcing its way thru our crosswalk as she tries to protect her kids who are in the middle of our crosswalk with both the red stoplight and the white safe-to-cross light on. The video is much more dramatic than the screengrab.