Eleanor Pinckney

Phillip: [00:00:00] All right. Today is Monday, February 6th. We're here in Eleanor Pinckney’s home in Brooklyn, New York. I'm Phillip Norman, and Ms. Pinckney, do you want to introduce yourself for the recording?

Eleanor: [00:00:12] Eleanor Pinckney, I live in East New York. I’m a homeowner. I'm president of the East New York Nehemiah Homeowners Association and an active member of our executive board, which we call BENS.

Phillip: [00:00:28] All right. We'll talk a little bit more about that. Thank you so much for doing this. And just to get started, could you tell me a bit of a little bit about where you grew up and what your upbringing was like?

Eleanor: [00:00:38] What my upbringing was like. Okay.

Phillip: [00:00:41] As in-depth as you want.

Eleanor: [00:00:42] We didn't cover this in the discussion. I grew up in Brooklyn, New York. I'm an original Brooklynite. My parents were both from Georgia, but they didn't meet there. They met here as young people and married. I come from a large family. I come from a family of 12. I had ten brothers, one sister. We grew up in Bedford-Stuyvesant. We grew up in a family home owned by my mother's sisters, a four story brownstone, a four story brick building, and every floor was occupied by my family. So that's the kind of upbringing that I had. Got married, lived in Clinton Hill. My parents bought a home in Clinton Hill before I got married. And, we were raised there, which is downtown Brooklyn. When I got married, I lived out in Williamsburg and then New Jersey for about 2 - 3 years. Moved back to Clinton Hill into an apartment there, I raised my daughter there. Then we bought, my husband and I, we bought this home here in 1989.

Phillip: [00:02:01] Okay. So what was it like growing up around so much family?

Eleanor: [00:02:06] So wonderful.

Phillip: [00:02:06] Yeah.

Eleanor: [00:02:07] It's wonderful. You know, you get to know all of your first and second cousins and a lot of times your third cousins. My family was, they liked getting together. Holidays were a big thing in my family, you know, in the building we lived in, there were never any locked doors. You went upstairs to see your uncle, your aunt, my grandmother. Everybody lived in the building. As I got older, then people began to move away, and they bought their own homes and things like that. But I got to know a lot of my cousins and a lot of my mothers and fathers cousins. So it's a very close family.

Phillip: [00:02:52] Yeah, it sounds like a really special experience growing up in a four level apartment building full of family. Definitely. That's very rare. Who are, like, some family members you really looked up to and who kind of, like, shaped you as a person, would you say?

Eleanor: [00:03:06] Oh, my mother and my father were the people that I looked up to. Yeah. My father was a longshoreman. My father and my mother, having both come from the south, were raised there. My father was very big on black history. Knowing black history and knowing your roots. And my mother also. So although we didn't get these things at school–and that's why they were so concerned, because they didn't teach these things in school. So a lot of what people are talking about now, you know, we knew as children.

Phillip: [00:03:44] Like what kind of things?

Eleanor: [00:03:47] Where we came from, why we were in this country. The relationship between black and white people. We talked about that.

Phillip: [00:03:56] Right. Right. And what did your parents really want you to know about black history?

Eleanor: [00:04:03] They needed you to know that there was a lot of black history that you should know because it wasn't being taught. And I think that's a problem–or it was a problem, but not as much now, because now it's been introduced into the schools. So children have a sense of pride about who they are and where they fit in. Because when you go to school and you look at the literature, you don't see yourself. You need to see yourself so you understand how you fit into the society.

Phillip: [00:04:34] Was there any history you really remember enjoying learning growing up? Or any kind of literature you saw yourself in that you enjoyed?

Eleanor: [00:04:43] Not really. You know I can't think of anything.

Phillip: [00:04:45] You can’t pick anything out. Right. Just generally they had a lot of lessons they were teaching. Yeah. Okay. Gotcha. So you studied sociology and psychology, right?

Eleanor: [00:04:58] In college. Yeah. City College.

Phillip: [00:05:01] City College. Okay. What drew you to those disciplines?

Eleanor: [00:05:04] What did I–?

Phillip: [00:05:05] What drew you to those disciplines? Sociology and psychology.

Eleanor: [00:05:08] What did I–? What was that word?

Phillip: [00:05:10] Oh, the disciplines. Those focus areas.

Eleanor: [00:05:12] Oh, what were my focus areas?

Phillip: [00:05:15] Yeah. Why were you interested in sociology, psychology. Yeah.

Eleanor: [00:05:25] Sociology, I thought, was a good fit for me because I was always interested in people. And I was trying to figure out, well, could I have a career where I could help black people, help people in my community? Sociology seemed to fit psychology because they go together. And sociology is so broad. It is so broad. It goes into so many other disciplines, you know, that you could, shoot off into, if you really wanted to major or do further study. Sociology is really the field to start at.

Phillip: [00:06:10] Okay. Were there any, in college or before I mean, other than your parents, were there any other people who were really important, like mentors to you, teachers? Anyone like that?

Eleanor: [00:06:20] Mentors? No.

Phillip: [00:06:21] Yeah.

Eleanor: [00:06:22] My mentors were all in my family.

Phillip: [00:06:24] Okay. Gotcha. When you were in school, did you have any favorite kind of teachers or professors?

Eleanor: [00:06:35] Let me think back. I have to say no. I have to say no.

Phillip: [00:06:45] Okay. Okay. So after school, you ended up in banking. That was most of your career, right?

Eleanor: [00:06:51] Right. Okay. I started out in insurance, and then I went to the bank. I got a job as a teller because I was going to school at night. So I got a job in the bank, and I stayed in banking for 39 years, and I moved up the ranks. So by the time I finished going to school in sociology, there's no point in me pursuing that because I was already in a career. I just stayed in that career.

Phillip: [00:07:23] Right. That makes sense. I'm remembering one more thing I want to ask about your mother. You said that she kind of influenced you to become, you know, involved in the community and politically.

Eleanor: [00:07:34] Right, because my mother was always involved in a Democratic club. And so sometimes I sit back and I wonder, well, how did she do it all? She was raising 12 children, you know. Where did she find the time to go, you know, to be active in these community things? Which she did. She was active in the PTA, you know, she went to the, you know, to the Democratic Political Club. If you asked her what was going on in the community, she could tell you.

And I remember she joined–our mother and father joined a community bank, you know, after they bought their home because they found it very difficult to get a mortgage, even though my father had a good paying job. They could not get credit for the type of job he was doing at that time. They didn't give credit to longshoremen. You know they made great money.

Phillip: [00:08:39] Right.

Eleanor: [00:08:41] So he ended up with someone who held a mortgage. And my mother was never comfortable with that. So she joined an organization called Paragon Credit. And that was a community based bank.

Phillip: [00:08:54] In Bed-Stuy.

Eleanor: [00:08:55] In Bed-Stuy, owned by the community. And she joined it and put her mortgage there. So I thought that was very smart.

Phillip: [00:09:05] Right. Yeah.

Eleanor: [00:09:06] As I got older, I realized that these are the kind of things that people in the community need to do to develop the community, need to have their own banks. That's something I had hoped that we could have developed out here, but we ended up with so many other issues to look at that we really couldn't focus on putting money together to develop a bank. I don't think that was the focus of EBC.

If they had thought about it, if they had given any thought to it, it might have been a really strategic step to take because instead of borrowing so much money, they could actually utilize the money within the community. And it would encourage the people in the community to save because they could see where the dollars are going. I strongly feel that our dollars should not be in these large banks because they don't have our interests at heart. If anything, all they do is draw out.

Phillip: [00:10:20] Money.

Eleanor: [00:10:21] You know draw out the wealth. It's not put back in a big way.

Phillip: [00:10:25] Right. So your kind of vision was for this community to be sort of self-determining in every way?

Eleanor: [00:10:30] Right. To have their own community bank. That should have been the next step.

Phillip: [00:10:34] Right. That's very interesting. Well, let's talk about when you moved in here initially, 1989. And kind of how did you find out about the Nehemiah homes and why?

Eleanor: [00:10:44] One of the girls I was working with, she had put her application in and she told me about it. She lived in Crown Heights, but she found out about the homes, as she mentioned to me. So she said, you guys need to go down and put in your application. So I said, okay. I spoke to my husband. They said, sounds like a good deal. We went down, we put in our applications. We waited three years. No idea. She told me she'd been on the list for a year. I never thought we'd have to wait three years. There were other programs where we sort of probably could have gotten something in a year. And my husband said, no, no, no, we need to wait for this. So we did.

Phillip: [00:11:30] Seemed like the best option to him.

Eleanor: [00:11:31] To him.

Phillip: [00:11:32] Okay. Yeah. At the time. Yeah. Why do you think so?

Eleanor: [00:11:35] I don't know. He saw what they did in Brownsville. He liked the fact that they had all of these contiguous houses in contiguous blocks. He thought that was good.

Phillip: [00:11:47] Right. Interesting. Okay, so a bit of a wait. What was it like when you first moved in?

Eleanor: [00:11:56] Oh, it was really wonderful.

Phillip: [00:12:00] Remind me, where were you living before you were renting?

Eleanor: [00:12:02] Renting in Clinton Hill.

Phillip: [00:12:04] Okay. Right, right.

Eleanor: [00:12:06] Rent was reasonable. Clinton Hill is a very good community. Always was. still is. It’s even more expensive now, beginning to rent something there or to buy something there. And at the time we couldn't afford to buy anything there. It was that expensive. A shell at that time was $100,000. That's a shell with no windows. Couldn't afford that. Not at that time. So we waited for this.

Phillip: [00:12:35] Right. And what were some of the differences made– just in your life, in your family's life, by owning a home for the first time.

Eleanor: [00:12:44] Well, this really wasn't– I didn't see it as a big difference because I had come from a family where they owned their own building. So to me it wasn't new where I live with my husband, he owned a co-op and I told him that this is how I was brought up. He wanted to buy another co-op, but I'm not the type of person who was raised in a co-op. I don't feel it's the kind of place you raise children. So to me, you know, the home was more in line with what I knew.

Phillip: [00:13:18] Right, right. Okay. Gotcha. And then when–I mean what was your awareness of kind of EBC and how they had been involved in it?

Eleanor: [00:13:28] I didn't know anything at all about them.

Phillip: [00:13:29] Okay.

Eleanor: [00:13:29] Nothing. I know nothing about them other than the fact that they were building these homes and they needed people who were qualified. You had to go on a list. It was very competitive. Let's say you put your name, today, and you had your down payment money. If they didn't call you in two years and you weren't disciplined and you spent that money, you were just out of it. So this, you know, the building and the turnover for the homes was very slow. Very slow. That's the one thing I noticed about them. It was very slow to, too, to get these homes up and built and you know get people in. So I don't know what the issues were on their end because as I said, I came in as a new homeowner, not as somebody who was here from the beginning when they were, you know, building.

Phillip: [00:14:25] Right, right. So, I mean, coming in at that time, a little after it initially started, what made you want to get involved in the homeowners association and kind of EBC by extension?

Eleanor: [00:14:36] Well, the community had problems. They had issues around here. I think I mentioned to you that–you see that building behind me? There was that building and it was another building further down. There were no houses on the street when I moved, just that building and another apartment building that was empty and abandoned. They tore down the other building because they were going to build on this strip. But the people here put up a big fight. They wanted to keep that building. They did not want to be put out. They put up a big fight and they won. So they were able to keep that building. But other than that, you know, it was really quiet. They were still building across the street. They were building on this street. So they were moving this way.

Phillip: [00:15:31] So what were some of the kind of early issues in the neighborhood?

Eleanor: [00:15:35] Well, eventually a drug dealer moved into that building and he took over that building. The people in it were afraid because I guess he had his people coming in and out, but they were dealing drugs in that building. I didn't want them in there. I didn't want them so close to me.

Phillip: [00:16:02] Right. Literally in your backyard?

Eleanor: [00:16:04] Exactly. And so there were homes at that time. By that time, there were other homes along this block. So they had a meeting and they came over and I had a meeting at my house, you know, about the drug dealing and how to get the police involved. And it was EBC-sponsored.

Phillip: [00:16:28] Okay. So organizers in your neighborhood.

Eleanor: [00:16:30] Yes, EBC came, and they said, Well, we can probably do something, but we need to get the people on the block involved. You know, let's talk to the people on the block. So we had already formed our block associations. We had a block association here. We had a block association on this block. So I said, well okay. They said, well would you like to, you know, be involved in that. And I said, okay, I'll be involved in the committee that, you know, was going to work with the police. We didn't really have to do too much because they did most of the work. But then, when the boards would have their meetings– They didn't have a board right away. They had to wait until I think they had like 750 homes or something like that. And then when they got that, they started looking for people to be on the board. And eventually I got involved with the board from working with that committee.

Phillip: [00:17:31] And who were some folks in the neighborhood or in EBC who you developed relationships with early on, or kind of brought you in to like some of the organizing that was going on?

Eleanor: [00:17:43] Well, Irving Domenech was one of the guys. He actually got me involved in working on that committee. Irving was very persuasive. On the homeowners association. There was a guy that was the first president. His name was Pinkson. Trying to remember what his first name was. He's still here in the community, but he was the first president. I like how he ran the organization. And eventually, when they had elections and they were still looking for people, then I decided to join. And I got elected on.

Phillip: [00:18:28] Okay.

Eleanor: [00:18:30] Been on ever since.

Phillip: [00:18:30] Been there ever since. Right.

*phone vibrates*

Eleanor: [00:18:40] I’ll just call them back.

Phillip: [00:18:41] All right. So you mentioned, I mean, so there is the issue with drugs. I mean, you also mentioned early on, kind of the community work issues were like sort of policing, racial bias and issues with police. Yeah. So tell me some more about that.

Eleanor: [00:18:56] Well, they found that the drugs were really tied to the precinct. I had some neighbors who lived on this block that were not Nehemiah homeowners, but they'd been here, raised in the community. And I remember one of them said to me, You guys, you think you're really going to clean up this problem? I said, Oh, why not? They said, the police, the police are the drug problem. The police are the ones. They're the ones bringing the drugs.

They're the ones running the drugs in the community. Don't you know that? I said, You're kidding me. I said no. Then we had an issue where one of the, people who was involved with EBC working with the police, they leaked her name to the drug dealers. They actually leaked her name from that precinct to the drug dealers, indicating she was one of the homeowners involved in trying to shut them down. And so I think for a period of time, I think she moved out of her house for a minute. I think she had to because, you know, she was little, you know, you don't know what these people are capable of. But they did leak her name. And that's when they realized she was the person, that just confirmed it.

And so what they did, and I give them a lot of respect for this, is they went right to the, the mayor and the deputy police people in charge of the policing in East New York. And they got that precinct commander moved. They got him moved. And as they started to look at that precinct, they realized they were having a problem in Long Island. These guys lived in Long Island, and they were dealing drugs not only here, but after about a year or so after this precinct command was changed, they busted the drug group in Long Island. They worked at that precinct.

Phillip: [00:21:05] Wow. So that was confirmed.

Eleanor: [00:21:06] Absolutely they confirmed it. Ever since then, I've noticed that like, every two years, the precinct commanders, they move them around so they don't have a problem anymore. They change them. And I think that's a good thing, right?

Phillip: [00:21:20] And the they who got the police commander removed was....

Eleanor: [00:21:23] EBC.

Phillip: [00:21:24] Right. Right.

Eleanor: [00:21:24] So that's East Brooklyn Churches.

Phillip: [00:21:26] And you mentioned Irving Domenech?

Eleanor: [00:21:27] Not Irving so much. But yeah, he was in the leadership then with the strategy team. So I was not involved in that.

Phillip: [00:21:37] Right. Right. But what did you learn from kind of in the times when you did participate or just observing that effort with kind of the police commander issue?

Eleanor: [00:21:45] Well, I looked at it from afar. I realized that they could do some things because they were outside of the political set up here. So they were not trying to move within these groups to try to do something. Because these groups, you know, these groups, for the most part, were inactive. They couldn't do anything because they were so entrenched in what was going on. You know, you didn't know the politicians, for all I know, they were all probably involved. Who knows what was going on out here. We were new people coming out here. They've been out here for years and problems persisted. They didn't seem to move or change until the new groups came out here. We weren't entrenched.

Phillip: [00:22:42] Right. Able to shake things up a little bit. Right, right.  When you began sitting on the board, what did that work look like?

Eleanor: [00:22:56] Well, street lights, sidewalks. Because we didn't have– We didn't even have street lights. Street lights, sidewalks. A lot of empty lights. Getting lots closed or fenced in. Getting sanitation. Getting sanitation on a regular schedule. Getting the people to do the jobs. Just cleaning the streets. You know, so it's as though nobody asked these people to do their jobs. You know, you’re not out here on a lark, you get paid, clean the street.

I remember one of the guys who was on the board with me. He lived a few doors down. He's since moved to South Carolina, he said. I was driving down the street and a sanitation truck is cleaning the street, and he's just blowing all the debris and all the stuff right around back, right into the street. He's supposed to have water in the truck. You know, that picks up all the stuff and puts it into the truck. He says the sky is just flying down. He says, I got in my car and I stopped him and I said, Do you know what you're doing? See, those are the kind of people that moved out here, people who are used to having services. He says, I told him, I don't, you know, he didn't take his name.

But he said, I tell him, you have to stop. You need to go and put water in that truck and do the job right. So these are the kind of people that were out here. But since then, like I said, people move on.

Phillip: [00:24:40] On. Right, right. So that was kind of that first group of new homeowners?

Eleanor: [00:24:44] Yeah. We were all very excited and very anxious to see things done.

Phillip: [00:24:50] Right. So was it exciting to kind of see things change over time as you made those efforts to improve the services and things like that?

Eleanor: [00:24:59] Yes. Yes, because the reputation for East New York was so bad and I couldn't understand why. But then again, the part of East New York remaining, and they had torn down all of the buildings coming this way. We were living, you know, with neighbors who were new. So we weren't seeing the things that they had seen. They had been out here for years when all these empty lots had been filled with garbage. And I mean blocks of lots where you see these houses. There were lots filled with garbage. It’s as though sanitation was throwing it right into the lots. How else could lots be filled with garbage?

Phillip: [00:25:45] And there weren't a lot of street signs in this area.

Eleanor: [00:25:47] No street signs, no lights.

Phillip: [00:25:50] Right, right. This was kind of building community where there was sort of nothing.

Eleanor: [00:25:56] Right. So they were the first group in New York, really, to look at the situation and try to do a big scale plan. I think other organizations, you know, they were building homes, you know, 5 or 6 homes like that. But this was a this was a big deal.

Phillip: [00:26:16] Yeah. Yeah. Talk about the scale of this. I mean, the East New York.

Eleanor: [00:26:21] Well we’re 1050 homes.

Phillip: [00:26:23] Okay. Wow.

Eleanor: [00:26:24] And they really could not get the city to, well, they didn't have full contiguous blocks where we could have, like, Blake Avenue coming this way? Couldn't get the cross streets going across because there were still houses out here. There were still people out here.

Phillip: [00:26:41] Right.

Eleanor: [00:26:43] So they did a lot of scatter site.

Phillip: [00:26:47] Right. But altogether about–

Eleanor: [00:26:49] 1050 homes were built.

Phillip: [00:26:52] Yeah. Cause when I walked out here, I mean I saw there was like a few houses over there, a few over here..

Eleanor: [00:26:56] And you, you know, you notice like the houses across the street, they were done by a group called the Partnership Program. And they’re still in business. They're still doing homes. So the partnership built a lot of homes out here in addition to EBC, but they didn't build blocks of them. So like this I think two houses over there. And two houses back to back on the other side and down at the end of this street. They were like two houses. I mean they did housing like that.

Phillip: [00:27:28] Okay.

Eleanor: [00:27:28] Scattered, or more scatter site than EBC did.

Phillip: [00:27:32] Yeah. Yeah. When we spoke last time, you kind of spoke about just having the mentality of preservation and kind of your role in preserving this community.

Eleanor: [00:27:40] Well, yeah. As we've progressed, you know, our focus has changed because now, after 30 years or so, we realize that *laughs* Things are changing. The city is not looking to do single family homes. Yes, there are a lot of homeless people, so they feel they have to have a lot of apartment buildings to put in people. But you can't put homeless people into apartment buildings. Homeless people cannot afford apartments.

That's why they’re homeless. So building apartment buildings is not the issue. Maybe finding out what the social problems are, why they are out of work. And homeless. Maybe that's really the focus of it, because if you could figure that out, then they won't be homeless. They need to make a living so that they can afford an apartment. Building new apartments is not going to take homeless people off the street. It might not even take them out of shelters if they don't have jobs. How are they going to qualify?

Phillip: [00:28:59] Right?

Eleanor: [00:29:02] See, that's what makes me wonder. That building apartments–Who are you building them for?

Phillip: [00:29:09] Right? Right.

Eleanor: [00:29:10] Don't say the homeless. Homeless can't afford this.

Phillip: [00:29:14] No more stuff from people for people moving here. Right.

Eleanor: [00:29:18] It's from people coming from outside the community. So now they don't want to build single family homes anymore. So where do young families go? What's affordable for them? Not a home. They have to continue renting. Because the dream of most young families is to have their own home. But you can't do that if you don't build them. So we want to maintain Nehemiah. We feel it's a safe alternative for young families like Jason.

Phillip: [00:30:10] So that's kind of the focus of the board.

Eleanor: [00:30:12] Right. We want to keep the community intact. It's the first type of community, they use it as an example to do building across the country. They're always bringing people here. Look at the Nehemiah. Look at what we've done. But we keep saying, Yeah, look at what you've done. But what are you doing? How are you going to maintain this? You know, we've got to hold on to it. Or else you won't have anywhere to bring people. That's our mantra. You know, we want to save Nehemiah. Stop the tear downs. If organizations want to buy single family homes and rent them, no problem.

But to buy a single family home and then tear it down and then replace it with apartment buildings, with garages like they want to. They’re doing one in Brownsville. We had a meeting this morning with the city. They, they have a permit to build a multifamily, and they're going to have parking garages, a multi-level parking garage that's going to be at the back of single family homes. So when they come out and look, they'll see this parking garage. Not only is it an eyesore, not only is it going to change the character of the community, but it's environmentally unsafe. Why do you need all those fumes? That's. That's a lot of automobile fumes.

You know, parking behind you, right. Does anybody think about that. Then it was another issue. the Communion Gas was running a gas line. It went from Williamsburg, through Bushwick, through bed site into Brownsville. There were fracking. Under the city. And do you know the hardest thing was to get them to stop?

Phillip: [00:32:25] Wow.

Eleanor: [00:32:25] Yeah. The city would not do it. The state, the city, the federal government–nobody really wanted to step in. They've kind of stepped in now, but it's there and it's running. Yeah, but they can't do much more because the community was up in arms. Brownsville and Greenpoint and Williamsburg. Who ever heard of anybody doing this type of work under a city?

Phillip: [00:32:54] Yeah, in a residential areas. Yeah. Yeah. That's what.

Eleanor: [00:32:59] But this is what happens if people are not aware of–  They don't care. They say it's for the future use. Nobody asked them to do that. They're going to increase the bills. You know, a building is going to go up in these areas. People are going to pay more and their health might be in jeopardy if these things leak. Look at all the issues they have out in the Midwest with all this fracking. Why do you suppose that people are up in arms out there?

Phillip: [00:33:31] Right. Yeah it’s a terrible practice. I want to ask you some more about kind of just the structure of the homeowner's association, and then BENS. So just say a little bit more about what that is.

Eleanor: [00:33:44] Oh, we have 15 board members. Each of the three areas and it did include Spring Creek. That's why it was called BENS The B is Brownsville, East New York, New Lots, and Spring Creek. That's how we got BENS. Okay. It was the officers or the elected people of the active members of these organizations who got together to talk about the issues that are common to all of us. You know, what do we do about the sewer? What vendors are you using? Who do you use? What do they charge? You know, how should we go about collecting the dues? You know, we're voluntary.

How much time can we spend sending out bills and calling people up and trying to get people to send money back and banking it– that's a business, right? And when you're working, you forget. We all were working people. We came out here as working people. How much time can you devote to that?

Phillip: [00:34:52] Yeah. And say a little bit more about the dues. What those are for.

Eleanor: [00:34:55] The dues is to maintain the independent sewer line that the city built out here. They built that independent sewer line. They said they saved $10,000 per house by not cutting into the city line directly. They ran an independent sewer line that only cut into the city at two ends, you know, the left in the right end. But the only people who got the advantage of that $10,000 were the initial owners. So that's why people buy out here now say–because we bought our homes at less than market value. That was the beauty of it. So this home might have been valued at about 120,000 when I bought it, but I only got it for 60. But people buying homes now, like Jason, they pay full market value. So they didn't see the benefit of, you know, that decrease. But they are responsible, along with everyone else, for maintaining the sewer line.

Phillip: [00:36:08] So that 120 goes exclusively to maintain the sewer line.

Eleanor: [00:36:12] Sewer line. Anything connected to board business.

Phillip: [00:36:19] It's 120 a year, right?

Eleanor: [00:36:23] A year. $10 a month. Come on. Give me a break. It used to be $5.

Phillip: [00:36:28] Right. Right. But inflation got you a little bit. Yeah. Well. Too bad.

Eleanor: [00:36:32] Well, if you go to print stuff at Staples. Yeah. I mean, you know, everything. The cost of everything goes up.

Phillip: [00:36:40] Right. Right. Okay.

Eleanor: [00:36:41] So, yeah, I don't think $120 a year is a lot.

Phillip: [00:36:45] No, no. Right, right. We'll say a little bit more just about. When did you become president of the–

Eleanor: [00:36:53] Oh this is my second. This is my second term as president.

Phillip: [00:36:57] Okay. How long are the terms.

Eleanor: [00:36:59] Till they vote me out *laughs*

Phillip: [00:37:01] Okay, good. I’m sure no one else is clamoring for that job.

Eleanor: [00:37:07] No. Not really. The guy I was, like, a first vice president a few times. And then I was president, and then somebody else came in. He was president. He resigned and the first vice president moved up, became president. He was president for about three years. And then he resigned. And then I became president again. I got voted in, I've been president for a while now for about, gee, almost ten years or more.

Phillip: [00:37:45] Okay.

Eleanor: [00:37:46] Well, I have to look back and see when I was voted in again as president, this is my second term. But, you know, we've tried to move the organization forward for the benefit of the community and everyone of the association. Because, as I said, we're volunteers, but we're trying now to put us more on a business level because, you have to deal with the homeowners. You have to deal with your neighbors. You know you don't want to knock on the door, “Okay, did you pay your dues this month?” You know, nobody wants to do that. Board members do not want to do that. They don't want to be involved in that.

So we have a property manager now. That's their job. To do the billing. Collect the money, bank it. Look after our sewer and along with, you know the oversight of the board, we have people who are responsible for the oversight of the property manager, who are responsible for the sewer part. And, so far we're doing well. So we're collecting money, starting to do liens, which we never wanted to do. But as time progresses, some folks just will never pay. And it isn't fair. Isn't fair to the people who do. So that kind of puts us in a–and I think it's a better situation for us because now it’s a property manager that's calling you up about delinquent dues.

Phillip: [00:39:39] Right.

Eleanor: [00:39:41] Not us.

Phillip: [00:39:41] Yeah. That's good. So with that off your plate, what? What becomes the focus of the association?

Eleanor: [00:39:52]Saving Nehemiah?

Phillip: [00:39:53] Okay, so tell me about that. What's the thinking there?

Eleanor: [00:39:54] One of the challenges is that, we’ve discovered the city has its own agenda. It wants to tear down single family and put up multi. And as I said, we don't want to destroy the community. We want to keep this community intact. It's historic. It's historic. So we really want to see it progress and remain this way.

Phillip: [00:40:25] Yeah. So do you see your work as kind of getting those newer people involved and helping engender that sense of preservation?

Eleanor: [00:40:32] Well, they don't at this point. We can't get so many people, too many people involved because at this point, we're dealing directly. Now we're at the point where we can deal with commissioners. We're really dealing at the top, talking about the issues for the associations, talking about issues for the sewer system. Talking about what to do about developers who want to buy in. When this was set up, it was set up, all our guidelines and bylaws were all directed towards single family homes. This was an agreement set up, the declarations with the city.

There was nothing in there about multifamily. So now we're faced with changing that bylaw so that it recognizes that the association is made up of not just single family or 1 or 2 family homes, but multifamily. The bylaws and the declaration that the city made the agreement on said that the lots were to be used for single family homes, and that if you have a building on the lot, that you are required to be part of the association and it's in the law, it goes with the land. So no matter what that's into perpetuity, it can't be changed, if you build on that lot you’re a member the association. So now we are at the point where we do have to get legal advice and legal, you know, help because we've got to change our bylaws now. Because there's been this change in the structure of the community. Gotta get legal help to talk about what to do about developers. What to do about collecting the dues from these people. What do we base it on? All of these things have to be worked out right.

Phillip: [00:42:50] So what would you want the new bylaws to say if you were to change it?

Eleanor: [00:42:55] That developers could buy property. But they cannot tear them down. But, how do you say that? I mean, how do we tell people what they can do with their property? You can't do that. But we could have the right of first refusal. Meaning that if a homeowner wants to sell their property, they have to come to us first. And maybe we'll go out and find a family. You know, if we have the right of first refusal, we can go out and find somebody to buy that home. They don't necessarily have to sell it to a developer. See right now people are free to sell it to anyone. So that's one of the things, one of the ways we think we can preserve Nehemiah.

Phillip: [00:43:40] Right. Creating some clause that could kind of change the general structure.

Eleanor: [00:43:45] As a general structure. And also indicating that buildings should not be torn down. Right.

Phillip: [00:43:52] Right.

Eleanor: [00:43:53] So that's the other thing, you know, do we want to go out and get some type of historic designation? There are so many different things that have to be looked at.

Phillip: [00:44:06] Right. You mentioned Weeksville when we spoke last–”We don't want Nehemiah to go the way of Weeksville.

Eleanor: [00:44:09] So you looked it up?

Phillip: [00:44:12] Yeah, I learned a little bit about it.

Eleanor: [00:44:14] But you see Weeksville. Well it's only three buildings left. That was a black community that lived here in Brooklyn when Brooklyn was its own city back in the 1800s, I think about 1850. Now Weeksville is gone. There's only three historic houses that tell you what life was like for black people who lived in Weeksville back in the 1850s. So do we want that for Nehemiah? Do you want to have, like, two houses here in East New York, or maybe three houses in Brownsville? Talk about it– call it the historic Brownsville houses.

We laugh about it, but who knows, 50 years from now, that could be the story, if we all just sit back and let things progress the way they look like they're progressing, that could be the story. Because like I have a corner house, these are very attractive because they could face it out on to Blake, which is more of a commercial street, and they have more land in the back of the house. They could do more with a corner property, and this is what they've been buying up.

Phillip: [00:45:35] Right. So I mean, what motivates you? This is hard work. So why do you stick with it? And you have very justifiable grievances. But I mean, why do you keep doing it?

Eleanor: [00:45:43] I'm retired now. This is my project. I'm retired. When I was working, you could not have gotten me to spend this much time. No. Could I go on a Zoom at 9:00 in the morning? I was on a Zoom this morning. No, no, no. I'm on some kind of meeting. Maybe three out of five days a week.

Phillip: [00:46:10] And these are all around Nehemiah?

Eleanor: [00:46:11] All around Nehemiah, around the different issues involved. You know, because we all come together and talk. Talking to attorneys, talking to maybe some of the politicians in the area. Because, we've done the hard work of getting people involved. We've done the hard work. Now, the idea is, how can we resolve the issue? We've got them to look the issue, but now we've got to come up with solutions that work right for everybody, you know?

Phillip: [00:46:47] Right.

Eleanor: [00:46:48] The city is involved and we've got to let them do their investigation. Right. So that's what we're doing. And most of the people now, we're retired. Right. So we can devote this time. We couldn't have done this ten years ago. We were all working.

Phillip: [00:47:06] Right. Right right. Sure. But some people retire and they take up crocheting or they build ships in bottles, so why not do that?

Eleanor: [00:47:15] I can’t do that *laughs* No, no, no, I can't do that.

Phillip: [00:47:18] How come?

Eleanor: [00:47:20] Because, I don't have–I'm not creative that way.

Phillip: [00:47:24] Okay.

Eleanor: [00:47:26] Okay. I have to use administrative tools that I've always used on my job. I was an AVP, so I have administrative tools. I read, I write, I, you know, have meetings, come to logical conclusions, act on those things, put things into place. Those are the tools that we bring to BENS. All the people involved in bands have been, you know, highly educated. They know how to plan something, how to put a plan together, how to make it run.

So that's why I think we've been successful. We’re business people putting all of our skills to work now before we were being paid for that. So we couldn't do this for Nehemiah. But now we can, we can put it together. Hopefully. We can save something for Nehemiah. I don't know how successful we'll be, but it looks as though we might win this. I think we're going to win this battle.

Phillip: [00:48:33] Yeah. Why do you think that?

Eleanor: [00:48:35] Because we've got the right people in place now. We've got the right people listening. So the idea is not just to have them listen, but to have them act.

Phillip: [00:48:45] Right in terms of the higher level.

Eleanor: [00:48:46] City, higher level of the city officials. Right.

Phillip: [00:48:53] Well, I got a few kind of just summative questions at the end here. So what has been the single greatest benefit in being a Nehemiah homeowner?

Eleanor: [00:49:02] Privacy. You know, you could stay in your home. You don't have to see neighbors when go out in the hallway. And  I like the fact that I could grow stuff in my backyard. I used to have a garden. I used to grow stuff all the time. And I think, the way you– When we were new, when we were all new owners out here, we were very close. I knew everybody on this block and on that block and on the block across the street. We were all very close. We spent time together. We raised our children together. But as–over time–as we got older and children move away and people get older and people move away, the communications break down a little bit. But I think the big advantage was it was a close knit community.

Phillip: [00:50:00] Well, let's give it a little texture to that. Who were some of your favorite people you met upon moving in, who you kind of raised your kids with?

Eleanor: [00:50:05] Oh please. I'm still involved with some of these people, they live across the street. I have 2 or 3 friends on the other side over there. So a lot of the people have died. A lot of the people that I knew, they’re gone. The people on my block here, a lot of them have moved away, you know, they're older, retired, moved away. Some have retired, moved away and moved back. One of my neighbors down the street told me, “It's too hot in Florida. I can't stay down here.” *laughs* I said, “You're kidding me!” She said, “Nooo, too hot.”

Phillip: [00:50:42] Right.

Eleanor: [00:50:42] She moved back.

Phillip: [00:50:43] Sure. Well those who are gone, those who are still here. I mean, just give me some names of folks and what you liked about them. And, you know why you were glad to be sharing this community with them?

Eleanor: [00:50:54] Well. Yes. We had things in common. We were common. You know, we raised our children together. A lot of these folks I would meet on the way to the train, going to work, on the way back. So a good sense of community. You know, you don't have that when you live in a high rise, on top of people. You don't have that sense of community. You know, we would all get out–It snows, right? Everybody comes out, everybody shovels snow, and everybody helps everybody shovel and clean off the snow. There's a problem, we would all call each other. Who's making all that noise? A strong sense of community. I loved that about this community when I moved here, and it's still to some extent that way. Still that way. Strong sense of community.

Phillip: [00:51:49] Yeah, that's an important thing. So, I mean, these new folks coming in or who you want to come in, who would you say to someone who's thinking about purchasing any of my home today?

Eleanor: [00:51:58] I'm saying you're lucky if you could find one that you could afford! *laughs* They’re half $1 million or more now. Are you kidding me? I bought this house for, like I said, 60,000. I would sell this house for between 650 and 7. This little house. But, I would tell anyone, I think it's a great community. A lot of churches. The schools, though, could use a lot of work. If I wasn't involved in Nehemiah, I would be involved in improving the educational system out here. Schools are not good. Most of the people who moved out here did not send their children to school out here. They sent them to private schools or to parochial schools. Isn't that something?

Phillip: [00:52:47] Yeah, right.

Eleanor: [00:52:49] Schools out here don't have a good reputation.

Phillip: [00:52:52] Did your children attend the schools out here? Were they better than or? No.

Eleanor: [00:52:55] I only have one daughter. My daughter went to a school in downtown Brooklyn. And when I moved here, she was going to her first year of high school. And she went to a specialized high school in the city. LaGuardia Music and Arts. That's one of her paintings.

Phillip: [00:53:13] Oh, beautiful.

Eleanor: [00:53:14] Wow. That's her first painting.

Phillip: [00:53:16] Oh my goodness.

Eleanor: [00:53:17] That's some of her work.

Phillip: [00:53:20] Sure.

Eleanor: [00:53:21] Okay. My daughter is deceased now. My daughter died about in 2017. She got ill and she died. But she was a creative. She did not go to school out here. She didn't know a lot of the kids out here, other than some of the kids on the block and the kids from this area who went to her school. Her school was that school that they based “Fame” on.

Phillip: [00:53:48] Oh no kidding.

Eleanor: [00:53:49] All right. So my daughter went to school all year long because in the summer they had summer school for them to make up for all the creative classes they had to take during the year. So my daughter's always in school. So you couldn't go to their school in the summer. Because this school was filled with students from their school taking the courses they need to make up so that they could go on to college.

Phillip: [00:54:19] Okay. Right. Alongside all the arts class.

Eleanor: [00:54:20] Arts. Exactly. Alongside the singing, the dancing, the drama–it was a funny school.

Phillip: [00:54:28] Yeah.

Eleanor: [00:54:29] But it was a great school.

Phillip: [00:54:30] I bet it sounds like an interesting time for sure. Well, wonderful. Was there anything we missed about the history of Nehemiah? Or about you ,or anything else?

Eleanor: [00:54:40] Well, not really. I can’t think of anything. I think you've hit on it. And I think I've tried to bring you up to date as to what the issues are for current leaders in Nehemiah, because I think that's what you were looking at, current leaders and the people I’ve given you, they’re current leaders.

Phillip: [00:55:02] Yeah. Right. Okay. Well, no, I'm excited to talk to some of them and I appreciate you again for doing this. Okay. And we will just leave a short pause on the end here and then we’ll be all done.