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NYCHA Community Centers Get Free Air Conditioners in The Bronx

By Eddie Small | July 29, 2014 4:11pm
 City officials hope the new air conditioning units coming to NYCHA Community Centers will help keep residents cool and safe.
City officials hope the new air conditioning units coming to NYCHA Community Centers will help keep residents cool and safe.
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DNAinfo/Eddie Small

CLAREMONT — Summer in The Bronx just got a little cooler.

The air conditioning company Friedrich is donating air conditioners to seven Cornerstone programs at New York City Housing Authority Community Centers in The Bronx this season to help residents stay comfortable.

The Bronx’s Butler Community Center on Tuesday is getting eight new air conditioning units, part of  150 air conditioners being donated to 38 Cornerstone programs at NYCHA Community Centers throughout the city, including Butler, Sedgwick, Highbridge Gardens, East 180th-Monterey, Edenwald, Marble Hill and Soundview in The Bronx.

Friedrich is also donating units to 16 centers in Brooklyn, eight centers in Manhattan, six centers in Queens and one in Staten Island.

All units should be installed by August 15, according to the the city's Department of Youth and Community Development, which runs Cornerstone to help children learn skills for success in school, work and community service.

Destiny Pierre, 15, who teaches classes in the Butler Community Center, said she was grateful for the new air conditioners, as they would help keep younger children happy, focused, energized and safe.

“When they’re hot, they become antsy, and they don’t want to listen,” she said.

Etthan Green, 12, who said he comes to the Butler Community Center every day, was happy with the new air conditioners as well. He said it had been hard to stay cool inside the building beforehand.

“It was fun, but we still were hot,” he said.

Deputy Bronx Borough President Aurelia Greene stressed that the added units were about keeping children safe in addition to keeping them comfortable, as they would help make the community center a more attractive destination for them to go.

"It makes a difference because our children have someplace to come and to play and to learn that is supervised," she said, "and so they don't fall victim to the elements of the street."

DYCD Commissioner Bill Chong agreed that the units could help children stay out of harm's way, as he said they tend to avoid facilities without air conditioning when it is hot out.

“Keeping people indoors during the summer, during the summer evenings, is helping keeping young people safe,” he said.

Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a $210.5 million NYCHA safety campaign earlier this month, which included expanding summer hours at 107 community centers until 11 p.m. and including an additional 850 NYCHA youths in the Summer Youth Employment Program.

"All of these pieces link together," said NYCHA Chair and CEO Shola Olatoye in a statement. "The Centers will be more comfortable, so more kids will hang here; there's supervision and things to do; and we will be collectively working toward the goal expressed by the Mayor, Council, NYPD and NYCHA residents of making communities safer."