Maybe it was an accident. Maybe it was deliberate.
Whatever the reason, the Mamdani Administration’s failure to include numerous immigrant neighborhoods in its new map of immigrant enclaves around the city showed a remarkable level of thoughtlessness by a team that claims to represent all New Yorkers, of all backgrounds.
If the omission was an accident, then the Administration had better improve its internal vetting process.
But if it was deliberate? Does that mean the new team at City Hall is trying to airbrush those who helped build this city — and still live and work here, and who made it a destination for others — out of existence?
When I first saw the map, it gave me pride in being a New York City native. Look at all the amazing new enclaves springing up all over the place, groups that were barely represented when I was growing up, groups that add every day to what Mayor David N. Dinkins famously referred to as our “gorgeous mosaic.”
Little India. Little Manila. Little Ecuador. Not one but two Koreatowns. Wonderful.
But then I looked more closely. Where was Woodlawn? Where was Borough Park? And, especially, where was Belmont in The Bronx? The city’s truly thriving Little Italy, home to countless children of Italian immigrants but plenty of actual immigrants too, including in recent decades many of Albanian descent.
I am chairman of the Belmont Business Improvement District and part of a family that has owned a bakery on Arthur Avenue for more than 100 years. I took this personally.
In the grand scheme of things, is the messed-up map a big deal, especially with so many other challenges facing our city?
I’d say it is, because public gestures are important, as is respect. Zohran Mamdani came into office with a wave of support from the city’s younger voters, and he deserves credit for that, but he will fail if he’s not the mayor of all of us.
And forgetting our communities is a bad sign.
Adding insult to injury, rather than owning up to the error –and, hey, we all make mistakes– he seemed to blame the unforced error on the previous administration. I mean, didn’t anyone in City Hall look at the map before it was released? (To his credit, he said the map will be fixed. I’m waiting.)
I’ll let Irish and Jewish descendants of those who came to our shores seeking a better life speak up for themselves. But let me take a second to remind everyone that New York would not be New York City without the Italian immigrants who came here and helped build it and whose contributions were historically overlooked.
Once we were the newest arrivals, and anyone with even a glancing sense of American history knows we were not welcomed. My family came from Monreale Sicily. My grandfather was 11, his brother Giovanni was 13 and his sister Marietta was 15. The three children came alone.
So as a proud Italian-American and chairman of the Belmont BID, on behalf of the many members, specialty shops, restaurants, bakeries, butchers, fishmongers, pastry shops, cafes, delis, barbers, and bars, many that have been in business for over 100 years and are celebrating three and even four generations, I say we will not be forgotten by the city government that excluded our contributions to the past.
The Belmont community has survived two pandemics, the Great Depression, and blackouts, yet, we have not left the city that has given us the opportunity to succeed and thrive. After the blackout of ’77, many deserted the Bronx.
Not us. We didn’t cut and run.
The city may have missed the boat by excluding our small but proud neighborhood from its map. But, there are other maps, many that matter even more.
These maps are the hearts and minds of those who lived and worked here over the past hundred years and their families, who still relish this neighborhood, as well as foodies from around the Tri-State region who visit us regularly because they appreciate our authenticity.
Those are in the hearts and minds of both the young and old who live and thrive here and those who visit us – for decades, or for the first time.
Peter Madonia is the Chairman of the Belmont Business Improvement District.
