As energetic as the rally at the hulking 1912 fortress was, it wasn't supposed to be necessary. After 12 years of demanding that redevelopment of the city-owned and mostly vacant Kingsbridge Armory include new student seats in this overcrowded school district, neighborhood activists with the Kingsbridge Armory Redevelopment Alliance – a coalition of Sistas and Brothas United, its parent organization the Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition, other community groups, and unions pressing for living wage jobs and schools at the site – thought they'd won.
But now the city Department of Education (DOE) says it won't build schools at the armory, maintaining that the current 2005-2009 capital building plan includes all the new school capacity the area needs. But that projection underestimates the neighborhood's educational needs, alleges Sistas and Brothas United, depending on a third of their classmates dropping out. The group is demanding that DOE amend its capital plan to include an additional 2,000 seats – the number Sistas and Brothas says is necessary to provide for all students – and commit to building them on the armory site.
Proposed changes to the capital plan were released Friday as the Department of Education began its annual reassessment of the document, said Margie Feinberg, a department spokeswoman. "The capital plan is a living document. We amend it each year. It's a continuous process," Feinberg said. Representatives of DOE, the Schools Construction Authority, City Council, Community Education Councils and parent groups discuss proposed amendments and decide which to approve by the end of January, she explained. In the spring it is submitted to Council and the mayor for approval, according to a timeline published with the proposed amendments. But while the capital budget is amended each year, the amendments are minor, Feinberg cautioned, focused on refining details rather than adding whole new buildings.
City Council Majority Leader Joel Rivera, who represents a neighboring Bronx district, said he would pressure the education department to commit to armory schools in the current capital budget. "We cannot settle for something that is not what we want. This is maybe the last big project that is going to be done in the Bronx. Let's make sure it is done right. Let's make sure City Hall is listening," he said in a passionate speech before the group began its march around the entire Armory structure.
Students struck a defiant note. "The Department of Education? They're not going to schools every day. They don't know what we're going through. We're taking classes in the principal's office, in closets, in the hallways," said Julia Ramirez, 16, a senior at Bronx International High School, as she marched on Oct. 27.
The Armory was built almost a century ago to house the New York National Guard. A regiment continues to drill in a building on the site, but the armory has been mostly empty for a generation. Beginning in 1995 members of the Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition – another sponsor of the recent protest – began pushing the city to build schools for the overcrowded district in the massive building. The Giuliani administration had a plan to turn the facility into solely a shopping mall and entertainment complex, but that project fizzled.
