Mount Vernon is broke. Our infrastructure is crumbling, our parks are neglected, and our streams are literally contaminated with sewage. State and federal investigators are probing the high levels of E. coli and fecal coliform in Laurel Brook as it runs through Hunt’s Woods. Residents have begged the city for years to take action. Instead, City Hall and the City Council have decided their top priority is Christmas decorations.
Let’s call this what it is: a slap in the face.
Hunt’s Woods tells the story. The city has ignored the open sewer running through it, ignored Bronxville’s illicit discharges, ignored the garbage bins and recycling that neighbors, not City Hall maintain. There’s literally an 18-inch tree growing out of the Gramatan Avenue entrance stairs like something out of The Jungle Book. The city does nothing while residents organize cleanups, pay out of pocket, and even crowd-fund a new bridge when the old one collapsed.
Meanwhile, the city council just voted to strip thousands of dollars from the parks maintenance budget to light up City Hall for Christmas. A broke city, facing federal investigation for pollution and sewer failures, is moving money away from critical infrastructure to string twinkle lights.
Compare this to Bronxville, which cut back on its holiday décor and redirected funds toward pumps and flood control. Bronxville residents get protection from flooding and sewer backups; Mount Vernon residents get “bread and circuses.” We get cosmetic distractions while our homes flood, our property is destroyed, and our children play near contaminated brooks.
This isn’t governance, it’s a Keystone Cops operation. The administration runs from accountability and issues press releases instead of solutions. They celebrate themselves with parties in filthy parks while ignoring shootings, flooding, and sewage.
At budget time this fall, they’ll come to residents, palm up, pleading poverty after wasting our money on lights and window dressing. But we should remember this insult when they do. Christmas decorations are nice when a city is thriving. In Mount Vernon today, they are an obscenity: the lipstick on the pig of a government that has abandoned its real responsibilities.
Mount Vernon doesn’t need more lights, it needs leaders with the courage to tackle the real problems: fixing our broken sewers, maintaining our parks, and protecting residents from environmental hazards. We deserve to be able to walk in our neighborhoods without being shot. Instead, Mount Vernon is sliding toward the fate of South Central LA and South Chicago, where drive by shootings claim the lives of innocent men, women, and children, all under the watch of failed leadership.
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