November 21, 2015: Healthy Neighborhoods
Last walk of the 2015 season, and we’ve walked over 1000 total miles!
Many old friends and new joined us on a chilly but sunny day. We kicked things off with a discussion on topics affecting the health of East Harlem: rezoning, climate change and pollution. And, of course, we proceeded to walk to places pertaining to the topics!
East Harlem is one of the neighborhoods undergoing rezoning under the Department of City Planning. Community involvement is facilitated by a series of community visioning sessions, and our first stop was at the session at the New York Academy of Medicine (NYAM). NYAM was a great host, and our families were welcomed, strollers and all! Plus, there was Spanish language translation and an activity room for kids to play while the parents attended the session.
While some of our families stayed to share their views on the process the rest of the group continued to our favorite community garden, Chenchita’s. We enjoyed our apples and bananas as usual and we had the added pleasure of hearing from Justin Wood of New York Lawyers for the Public Interest (NYLPI). Justin told us about the NYC Council Intro 495, which is a first step in changing the way garbage is handled in NYC: the intro limits the maximum capacity at certain facilities. And you can see the letter we signed for City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito here. Print one out and send it to the speaker if you agree! And view Justin’s slides here.
Our last stop of the day was a visit to another long-time friend, Mac Levine and Concrete Safaris. We’d previously visited for our Climate and Communities walk last year, and we participated in Concrete Safaris’ Jungle Gym event earlier this year. We pitched in cleaning up leaves in the Jefferson Houses garden site, and composting them.
It was another great walk, another great day in East Harlem, and another great season of Cada Paso! Thanks to all the families and friends and colleagues and volunteers that have made the program so successful!
Stats
Date: November 21, 2015
Adults: 36
Children: 55
Total: 91
Miles: 2.14
Calories: 350*
Time: about 2.5 hours
Co-leaders: Cappy Collins, Emma Murphy, Maria Reyes
Special Guests: Dorothy Calvani, Noraida Colon, Francenia Graham, Mac Levine, Juleon Robinson, Jashan Sandhu, Dava Weinstein, Justin Wood
2015.11.21_Cada Paso_EH Rezoning_Visioning Session
Click here for the Panoramas of this walk!
*http://www.nutristrategy.com/activitylist4.htm
“Walking, under 2.0 mph, very slow,” 155lbs = 140 kcal/hr