Ask the Bronx Borough President: November 2025

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Ask the Bronx Borough President: September 2025

Ask the Bronx Borough President: August 2025

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Ask the Bronx Borough President: June 2025

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0925BXAsktheBPBblock_2023-09-25-19-34-18

Welcome back to ask the borough president everyone. BP Vanessa Gibson with us here taking your calls and I don't want to waste any more time. Let's get right back to the phone lines and let's go to Regina in Pelham Parkway. She's joining us tonight. Thanks for calling in. What's your question for the borough president? Hello, MS Gibson. My question is this. We have a 501 C three animal shelter in the Bronx. We are one of the only boroughs that have been fighting for a shelter for the longest of time and though it's coming not soon enough, unfortunately, we have suffered a great deal from the pandemic with lack of funds and lack of services. A shortage of veterinarians. And my question to you is this, we already are struggling with vets because we no longer get rescue discounts because vets are at a premium and they don't want to offer rescue discounts. The ASPCA has a lack of vets so they can help us stay neuter. But more importantly, we have seen such an up rise of animal abuse and the A S PC A handed off that responsibility to the NYPD unfortunately, when you call about very serious cases, I'm not talking about somebody tying their dog up to the gate inside their own property. I'm talking about serious animal abuse where the animals are severely injured and we're calling the police and the police are telling us that it's not their job. And I know a couple of senior police officers that have told us to call 311 and document it so that when and if there's an investigation, there's proof of a report, not just calling the precinct, but you call 311. And not only do you get the case closed within minutes, but nobody goes and investigates them. And what happens are these cruelty cases are burdening the rescues that are trying to pick up the people that have been evicted and gave up their animals, people that became homeless and had to give them up. People that can't survive after the pandemic and the cost of living prices, rescues are drowning and we just don't have the resources and we're not getting the help from our officials. We've tried to call the Department of Agriculture who governs us. They tell us it's not their problem. We tried to call the attorney general who we also have to register with and she's more concerned with police abuse than animal abuse. And I get it, MS Gibson that the world is turned upside down and people are crazy and stressing all agencies of New York City. But you know, the animals are an intricate part too and you know, to watch this is heartless you. If you would have seen some of the abuse that we see it would sicken you that people get away with this. They don't go to jail for it. But when we don't even get our supported agencies to help us, it just seems like, you know, we had one case quickly that the person was arrested for leaving his dog in an apartment for four weeks without food. The guy was arrested in Mount Vernon and he was taken in. Everybody made fun of the officer that arrested him one month to the day that he was arrested, he was arrested for killing an 18 year old kid in Mount Vernon. So sooner or later it kept his up, either they're domestic abusers or they go out and they kill people on the street for no apparent reason. But anybody that can do some of the horrendous things that we've seen done to these animals and to just be let go with a slap on the wrist eventually becomes a very big strain on the Regina. Thank you for your question tonight. I apologize for having to cut you off a little bit. I wanted to just have give you a chance to answer her questions. So we get to a couple other callers tonight. Wow. No, that's very unfortunate and certainly animal abuse. We take very seriously and is a priority for us for our district attorney as well as the NYPD. So I would love to speak with our caller offline about some of the specific things that we would recommend. Uh 501 C three organizations can funded by the local council members through the city's budget through the New York City Council, $20 million to construct a brand new Bronx animal shelter in the northeast Bronx is already under way. And so that's a good thing because we don't have one. and we need one, but also we need to find better ways to really prosecute those offenders and those habitual offenders that have a history. Right? And those may not be, you know, one time of first time offenders, but certainly they have a history. And so we have to send a message. So I would love to speak with the caller off line to find ways that we can identify to help support the 501 C three. But the broader message is making sure that there is a system within the NYPD, the District Attorney's Office where they can prosecute cases and also a process that cases can even come forth besides 311. So if it's another system, we should talk about that offline. Right. Regina, we have your information, we'll make sure that we pass that along to the borough president and I wanna see if we can get to at least one more caller tonight. If we can. Let's go to Michael, uh, joining us from Norwood tonight. Michael. Thanks for calling in. What's your question, Michael. Are you there? Hello? Hi, Michael. What's your question for the borough president? Ok. I have a question for Mr Gibson. I'm trying to find out when are they gonna do something for all that traffic that's on a, that goes from 100 and 49th Street and Third Avenue all the way up to 100 and 61st Street and Third Avenue. Ok. It's mad traffic. Illegal. Illegal cars are park, park illegal, excuse me. And then you have double park cars which makes it hard for the 15 and the 21 bus to get up and down that main thoroughfare right there every day. I'm getting on that bus coming from work or going to work. It takes half an hour to 45 minutes to get from 149th street to 161st street. And it shouldn't take that long. It should take like about 15, 20 minutes to get up to half man, Michael. Thank you for the question there. What do you know about? Do you know anything about this street or the strip? He's talking about traffic in the bus lane. It's an enforcement issue. We have to move buses. The Bronx buses are some of the slowest in the city and we can do better. We should do better. We have to work with mtanypd traffic enforcement to keep traffic out of the bus lane so the buses can move. And Third Avenue 149 is the hub, major thoroughfare, connections to the subway. Uh, going north and south. We got to make sure we clean the traffic up out of the bus lane. All right. Well, we're gonna talk a little bit about some of the MT A programs that will come up just now. You got a tip for us and there's some events coming up in the next month that we need to hear about. All of that is coming up right after the break. We're gonna pack it all in right here on ask the borough president. So stay with us. We'll be right back.

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0925BronxAsktheBPCBlock_2023-09-25-19-37-18

Right. Welcome back to the BP, everybody. And borough president Vanessa Gibson is with us. And as always, you've got a help tip for us this month, a very important one this week. Yes, October, we recognize that Domestic Violence Awareness Month, we wear purple, go purple because domestic violence, gender based violence, intimate partner abuse and elder abuse affects millions of people, women, Children, seniors, men, older adults. And we're announcing a campaign to combat domestic violence beginning October 1st, we have a 31 day of action for the entire month of October. And on Monday, October 2nd, we're going to have a press conference in the rotunda at Bronx Borough Hall to talk about DV, services for clients, for survivors to lift up the families impacted by DV. And that's why it's important to know the warning signs but get help, get information. We're going to share legal resources and protections afforded by the court system safe havens. Most of all listen to people, give them a voice, hear them out, be sympathetic and make sure that you seek help a very important month and always very well represented for us here, the borough and these events And so that being said, you've got a lot of events coming up. I do, you mentioned one of them there, but you got a lot happening over this next month. I do. So we're starting with uh September 26th. We have the 23rd annual Bride's March. It begins at 10 a.m. at Bronx Borough Hall. We're going to be uh at 11:45 a.m. but we'll be at the Holy Root Episcopal Church at 7 15 West 1 79th Street. And then we'll be in the Bronx Borough Hall at 8 51 Grand Concourse at 11:45 a.m. And, and we have the city's first ever street harassment public survey. We're going to do a day of action on September 27th from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the 1 49 street Grand Concourse Station at 28 39 3rd Avenue near the Third Avenue, two and five subway station, September 30th D 75. Back to school bash for district 75 scholars and families at the Mott Haven campus at 7 30 Concourse Village West from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. We are having the first making strides. Survivor fashion show also September 30th from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Bay Plaza Mall in the food court on the upper level. Uh We also have on Monday, October 2nd PS one forty's first annual community fair, uh 12 p.m. to 3 p.m. 9 16 Eagle Avenue Monday, October 2nd, also Monday October 2nd at 11 a.m. We're having our DV press conference at Bronx Borough Hall at 8 50 one Grand Concourse. And then we have dads take your child to school day on Tuesday, October 3rd from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. We'll be at CS 55 at 4 50 Saint Paul's Place in the Bronx. And then we are joining Bronx District Attorney, Darcel Clark, the New York Yankees, Saturday, October 7th uh 9:30 a.m. We have East 1 61st Street Grand Concourse. We have our annual five K walk run and roll Italian Heritage on October 12th, Hispanic Heritage on October 19th, Teeth and Tour de Bronx, Sunday, October 22nd, 2023. Tour de Bronx at 10 a.m. 1 61st street and the Grand Concourse. You flew so fast you up all of our, you are gonna be very, you're gonna have to be fast to all these events. Uh This 0.1 that's for sure, real quick before I let you go. Another thing that started just this week that mt a free fair program. I mean, free buses here in the Bronx. How's this going so far? So far? Uh So far so good. We just started on Sunday, September 24th and the route for the Bronx is BX 18 that goes through Highbridge and Marvis Heights. It is free. It says it's the free bus. It's for a six month pilot and it was a part of the state adopted budget. All thanks to the state legislators in the Senate and the Assembly for passing this and in six months, we'll see how successful it is. BX 18. All right. So next time you're here, we'll talk about it a little bit more and see how everybody will. Yes, we will. All right, sounds good. BP Gibson. Thank you for being here with us. Thank you for everybody for calling in tonight. We'll have another episode of Ask the Borough President next month. So get those questions ready and hopefully join us right here on news.

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News 12's Kurt Semder sat down with Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson for this month's edition of Ask the Borough President. 

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