Some habits are difficult to break.
The Hub in the Bronx was business as usual, drug-filled, the day after the Post's exposé about the legions of drug addicts and debauchery that preyed on commercial streets.
When The Post returned to the scene on Monday, addicts openly mixed opioids and injected them into their arms and necks, sometimes leaving blood on the sidewalk. Some people may have overdosed outside of Dunkin Donuts.
Many drug addicts sat drunk on benches in Plaza Roberto Clemente, where dealers brazenly peddled their wares with seemingly impunity, and the presence of the NYPD increased. That never happened.
In response to the Post's report, the Rev. Ruben Diaz Sr., a former Bronx borough councilman and state senator, implored President-elect Donald Trump to intervene and fix the hub.
“The shocking show never ends,” he tweeted. “I'm calling on @realDonaldTrump to come back to the Boogie Down Bronx and help seniors and residents enjoy our recreation areas.”
The desperate appeal for the president-elect to be tough on crime comes amid years of sustained but unsuccessful efforts to eradicate the drug problem plaguing “Broadway in the Bronx.”
“garbage dump”
The latest effort to clean up The Hub took place in October and November, with a multi-agency “community link operation” that saw NYPD officers and Department of Health and Human Services officers address quality-of-life issues. I worked on it.
Police say the effort resulted in 35 arrests, 150 moving violations and 25 criminal citations.
Homeless Services officials also witnessed 366 “active substance users” and 28 drug transactions, and placed 47 people in shelters, city officials said.
But by the time the Post spent several days at the hub in late November and early December, nothing seemed to have changed.
“In my opinion, the situation has only gotten worse,” said City Councilman Rafael Salamanca (D-Bronx), who represents The Hub.
The City of Salamanca detailed years of frustration after former Mayor Bill de Blasio allegedly dropped the ball. $8 million in overdose prevention efforts For the NYPD's failure to crack down on dealers.
He supports their efforts, but worries that the commercial center is becoming too saturated with social programs, meaning that the area will ultimately continue to be a haven for drug users. .
“There are nearly 20 nonprofit organizations that distribute needles, provide substance abuse programs, distribute methadone, and provide methadone clinics, all of which address homelessness in their immediate communities. We have homeless shelters, and that's a recipe for disaster,” he explained.
“When you overpopulate a particular area with a substance abuse problem of that size, you're never going to get the results you want, and that area is going to stay like that forever until you start moving some of the programs away. The situation will continue.”
Pedro Suarez, executive director of the Third Avenue Business Improvement District, like Salamanca, broadly supports the work of substance abuse clinics, but wonders if they can be expanded further. .
He said the bigger problem is that addicts are shut out from many other parts of New York City, and few areas are willing to host services for them.
“I feel like the South Bronx has become a dumping ground,” he said, insisting he was “not directly criticizing” substance abuse service providers.
Volunteers at St. Ann's Corner of Harm Reduction are distributing syringes, bandages, distilled water, bottle caps, cotton wool and other items in an effort to protect drug addicts from overdose, HIV infection and other side effects of dangerous habits. We regularly distribute drug paraphernalia for events.
But Stephen Hernandez, the group's chief of staff, said outreach services follow addicts, not the other way around.
He said The Hub has been attracting addicts since the 1960s.
“The hub is where everything happens,” he told the Post. “It's where people buy groceries, they go to doctor's appointments, they go to banks. And it's where people buy medicine. It's always been that way.
“There's always a chicken-and-egg conversation where people try to blame outreach workers and harm reduction programs, because 'you guys are providing a service there, drug dealers are there. 'No, we're there because the drug dealers were already there,' he continued.
“Our goal is to close down when our services are no longer needed.”
Additionally, while The Hub may have many drug outreach services, there are no brick-and-mortar drug abuse counseling services, forcing drug addicts to use on the streets, Hernandez said. .
Meanwhile, many local residents complain that the NYPD isn't doing enough to crack down on dealers.
Those concerns were further amplified by U.S. Rep. Richie Torres (D-Bronx), who sent the following questions to Mayor Eric Adams in September: Letter asking city to crack down About the “open air drug market”.
“When I went to see the drug hotspot for myself, I was shocked not only by the seriousness of the situation, but also by the lack of anything resembling a strong police presence,” he wrote. . “It was a scene of lawlessness and disorder.”
Siraj Bayat, owner of Willis Discount, a local general store in Roberto Clemente Plaza, said Torres' visits and letters had results, but only temporarily.
“When Richie Torres came here about two months ago, the police were coming two or three times a day and drug use was down,” he said. “Once Torres was gone, everything went back to normal.”
A designated group of NYPD officers patrols The Hub seven days a week, both on foot and in vehicles, a police spokesperson said.
As of December, the 40th Precinct, which covers The Hub, had made about 1,200 drug arrests, a 20% increase from the same time last year, police said.
“The police have nothing to do with it.”
On a cold Monday, Nileen, 23, of the South Bronx, walked through an open-air drug market that is a monument to the persistence of toxic substances and the incompetence of New York City government.
“It's very common around here for people to shoot guns on the sidewalk, but the police don't care,” Nileen said. “In the South Bronx, it's normal for police to walk past drug deals and drug addicts.
“There's a new police precinct right there,” she said, pointing to the NYPD's new 40th Precinct building on the same block, “but they don't care.”
The Post found no signs of additional police presence and all signs of deep-rooted drug crime.
Addicts openly mixed and injected opioids on Brook Avenue, across the street from the Horizon Juvenile Center, where the Post previously witnessed an overdosed man being revived with naloxone.
Five addicts sat on the sidewalk with grocery catalogs for mixing heroin and fentanyl shots, distilled water and drugs in bottle caps. They drew the dose into a syringe through cotton wool.
One addict had tied a tourniquet around his bicep before injecting himself, which disrupted his veins and caused blood to gush out onto the sidewalk.
Another patient collapsed on all fours with a long stream of snot dripping from his nose, next to another addict who was preparing a shot.
Around the corner from Dunkin' Donuts on East 149th Street, a man wearing ill-fitting shoes was foaming at the mouth and collapsed unconscious before being taken away by FDNY paramedics.
The newspaper could not determine whether the man had overdosed or had an unrelated seizure, but Dunkin' employees said addicts are common in the store.
“He was foaming at the mouth, then drooling, then shaking and then collapsing,” the Dunkin' employee said.
“Maybe it was drugs, maybe he drank too much.”
Bayat, a general store owner, said he believed the solution was for police to forcefully remove the dealers.
“If you take out the dealers, the addicts will leave,” he says.
“Addicts are here because this is where the dealers are. Charities are here because this is where the addicts are. Addicts are not here for charity, they are buying drugs. I’m here to do it.”
