Safe Streets is a community organization representing the West Side of Binghamton north of Main Street. Our mission is to improve the quality of life in our neighborhood, a twenty block area bounded on the east by Front Street, on the west by Jarvis, and extending north to the railroad tracks. Organized in 1995, the original Safe Streets was a neighborhood watch group consisting of 30-40 members w
ho met monthly. We worked closely with the City of Binghamton to confront the crime and code-related problems in our area. Through our advocacy we brought neighborhood policing to our streets. This group officially disbanded in 2000, leaving a small group of residents who met periodically to deal with particular neighborhood issues. Those Safe Streets members became the core of our present organization, a small group which started meeting bi-weekly in 2009 to address the new problem of gangs in our neighborhood and advocate for its rehabilitation. Our membership includes: two CEO’s who have businesses in the neighborhood, J&K Plumbing and Horizons Federal Credit Union; two landlords with rental properties in the neighborhood, one of whom has lived in the neighborhood since 1988; and two long-term residents, one with a rental property, the other with a bed and breakfast in her home. We are regularly joined by our City Council representative, members of the City of Binghamton Code Department, and representatives of the Binghamton City School District, as well as concerned citizens who live in other areas of Binghamton. The Mayor of Binghamton is a strong supporter of our work and makes occasional appearances at our meetings. Safe Streets has developed an important role as a facilitating organization, bringing people together to address neighborhood problems. Along with the COB, our partners include Binghamton University, Broome County Gang Prevention, and Cornell Cooperative Extension. Our co-chair is a member of the COB Youth Initiative. Two of our members sit on the Community Advisory Panel of the Broome County Land Bank. Safe Streets members are proud of our achievements over the past six years. Besides building a safer neighborhood and bringing student residents back to the area, we have hosted a block party and orchestrated two street mural events in collaboration with Binghamton University’s Design Your Own Park initiative. We cooperated with VINES to develop a community garden, to which the Southern Tier Young Professionals donated $3000 and 100 work hours. One of our members purchased a vacant property in the neighborhood and donated it to the COB as a park for our youth. In 2013 BU’s PricewaterhouseCoopers Scholars raised $22,000 to build a toddler playground at the park. More recently we have been working with a member of the Binghamton University faculty to create a strategic plan, a necessary step as we address our ever-expanding role in the community. And we are very pleased to announce that three Binghamton University professors will be conducting community-based research projects with graduate students during the spring of 2015. The diversity of our neighborhood is its strength. We are a community of homeowners and renters, families and students—both graduate and undergraduate—business owners and retirees, all of us united in our desire to make our community a better place. We invite you to join us.
