The NYPD along with a cohort of other city agencies flooded the seedy South Bronx district dubbed the “Broadway of the Bronx” — booting drug addicts and vagrants from the area and cleaning up their trash.
Police put up barricades Thursday blocking access to Roberto Clemente Plaza, the pedestrian park and heart of the “The Hub” at the crossroads of Willis Avenue, East 149th Street and Third Avenue that for years has been overrun with strung-out junkies.
“We’re not going to let that Hub go back to where it was. This is going to be our ground zero here in The Bronx,” declared Kaz Daughtry, deputy mayor for public safety.
The city Office of Emergency Management, one of more than a half dozen agencies that swept in to stabilize the area, set up a new command center in the plaza, according to Camille Joseph Varlack, deputy mayor for administration.
The NYPD has added patrols and the Department of Transportation has beefed up enforcement in and around the plaza.
More lighting has been erected at each end of the plaza, Varlack told The Post in a joint interview with Daughtry.
She vowed a concerted, long-term effort to stabilize The Hub akin to the city effort to clean up Roosevelt Avenue in Queens.
“We’re not just about the optics of cleaning it up. We are really about trying to deal with the underlying issues,” Varlack said.
Local leaders have pointed to the dozens of nearby drug treatment facilities as the source of the plaza’s problems.
Many of the addicts, homeless individuals and other vagrants congregate in The Hub, scaring customers from patronizing surrounding businesses, merchants said.
The city cleanup effort was launched just hours after Bronx Rep. Ritchie Torres sent Mayor Eric Adams an SOS letter and released a hard-hitting report detailing the hellish conditions in the area.
Varlack said the mayor’s office will meet with state officials regarding the licensing oversight and siting of drug treatment programs.
The state Office of Addiction Services and Supports licenses substance abuse treatment programs, but the city oversees zoning that governs where facilities can be located.
“The response is the most aggressive we’ve seen. I hope the mayor’s response will be sustained,” Torres said.
“I’m grateful the mayor has made cleaning up The Hub a priority in the short term. We need a commitment in the long run. It is unacceptable to tolerate an open air drug market in The Bronx,” added Torres.
