$2.5M environmental justice grant to fund new HEARTS community center in Mott Haven
The funding will support the HEARTS Center, a project led by South Bronx Unite, the organization that created the community land trust that controls the site.
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State officials announced more than $12 million in environmental justice grants across New York, with $2.5 million awarded to South Bronx Unite to create a new community center in Mott Haven focused on health, education and job training.
The funding will support the HEARTS Center, a project led by South Bronx Unite, the organization that created the community land trust that controls the site. It's a project community leaders say is designed to address longstanding environmental and economic disparities in the South Bronx.
"It has historically not been invested in," said Michael Johnson, co-founder of South Bronx Unite.
For 26-year-old Donald Folks, opportunity made a lasting difference. Folks is a graduate of Green City Force, a program that offers green job training to young people living in NYCHA developments.
“It changed my life a lot for the better,” Folks said.
The HEARTS Center will partner with Green City Force to provide job training, while also offering after-school homework help, health screenings, counseling and art and music programs.
“We need extracurricular activity; we need job training. We need to get our people employed and increase their occupational outcomes,” said Johnson.
Tonya Gayle, executive director of Green City Force, said the center’s broad focus will help reach more residents beyond environmental programming alone.
“It’s such a combination of interests across health, education and arts — the opportunity and invitation to meet all of the communities,” Gayle said. “We’re not only meeting with folks interested in the environment. It’s a wider net.”
The center will be in the former Lincoln Recovery Center, which closed in 2011. Advocates say the building once served as a place of healing and can again meet critical community needs.
“The services that were provided here before actually healed people from substance abuse, and now we’re trying to heal our community with the various needs we have — social and emotional needs,” Johnson said.
Construction is expected to begin soon, with plans to open the HEARTS Center in early 2028.
