The New York City Charter requires the City be divided into Community Districts (CD) along such boundries that coincide with the historic, geographic and identifiable communities.
These CD's are the day to day representatives on NYC Government; each CD has a Community Board (CB) the Board consists of up to forty unpaid volunteers drawn from the respective district & are then appointed by the relevant Boro President. The local City Councilmember gets to nominate half of the Board Members which in turn serve for a two year term with no term limits. These Boards have various subcommittees such as Police, Education, Parks and Transportation etc.
CB 3 covers Bed-Stuy & its' membership's makeup have raised concerns that it does not represent the diversity of the Bed-Stuy Community. CB 3's forty Members are all drawn from the same socio-demographic. CB 3's forty Members are 100% Black, mostly elderly & all are wealthy residents of Bed-Stuy's brownstone set. There are NO Housing Project Residents despite Bed-Stuy being the situs to eight housing projects which house some 35,000 people. There are NO Hispanic, White, Asian or American Indian Members.
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The lack of diversity is stunning yet neither Brooklyn Boro President Marty Markowitz and Bed-Stuy's City Councilmember Al Vann will respond to inquiries concerning the absence of diversity on CB 3. What do Bed-Stuy residents think about the lack of diversity on CB 3?
