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November 26, 2006
New York Times Blight on Blight Smackdown!
The New York Times ran two stories about blight - Pacific Street in Brooklyn vs. Pacific Avenue in Atlantic City. Let the blight fight begin!
Round 1: Pacific Street, Brooklyn
Blight, Like Beauty, Can Be in the Eye of the Beholder
For many of the several hundred people who still live there, “blighted” is a term of abuse, one that ignores the sleek, recently renovated buildings on Pacific and Dean Streets, the bustling neighborhood bar, and other signs of revival. Even some supporters of the project, like Assemblyman Roger L. Green, disagree with the description.“That neighborhood is not blighted,” Mr. Green, whose district includes the Atlantic Yards site, said at a hearing last year. “I repeat, for the record, that neighborhood is not blighted.”
Round 2: Pacific Avenue, Atlantic City
Broken Lives and Victims in Shadow of Taj Mahal“You’re in the middle of crack city,” Mr. Boccino said yesterday at his restaurant, surveying this blighted corner of Atlantic City, where the authorities think at least some of the four women found dead in a drainage ditch on Monday were known and spent much of their time.
Not far from the Boardwalk, it is the kind of neighborhood where trouble puts its feet up. Drugs and prostitution are the main pursuits of those who visit here, and of those who stay.
Up the street, on Pacific Avenue, prostitutes lean against pawn shop windows lined with engagement rings, scouting for customers.
Posted by amy at November 26, 2006 11:55 AM