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The Greater Harlem Coalition

Who We Are and Our Mission

We have united 150+ Harlem based organizations to work for a vibrant, tolerant, clean, and safe Harlem where families, visitors, businesses, and all residents can thrive. To this end, we rely on data analysis to expose how New York State and New York City have packed excessive concentration of Drug Treatment, Harm Reduction, Adult-only Shelters, Mental Health Services into Harlem and other neighborhoods of color resulting in a concentration of people struggling with mental health, homelessness, and addiction.

Our goal is to balance compassion with the demand that all communities take their fair share. We want to end the decades-long practice of packing programs in this historic neighborhood while supporting our neighbors who continue to struggle with disproportionate, systemic, and generational health, economic, social, and safety disparities.

Explore how multiple government agencies simultaneously used Harlem as a containment zone below:

Excessive density of Drug Treatment Programs allocated by New York State Office of Addiction Support and Services (OASAS)
Excessive density of Adult-Only Shelters allocated by Department of Homeless Services
Excessive density of Single-Adult Supportive Housing allocated by Department of Mental Health (DOMH)
Excessive density of Harm Reduction Programs, including the nation’s first safe injection site, allocated by Department of Health

These services are densely located on 125th Street, where renowned Black Cultural Institutions are placed. Sadly, Harlem is the Black Cultural Capital, but decades of structural racism has relegated it as NYC’s containment zone.

Dr. Ryan McNeil of Yale’s School of Medicine’s Insults Harlem Residents and Proposes to Commit Research Fraud.

WHAT DO WE DO?

Raise Awareness

Seek press coverage via in-person and online events and distribute relevant news and data to our members and to social media to raise awareness. To see past events, click here

Political Advocacy

Engage politicians to advocate our agenda. See our requests for policy change and some past letters to elected officials.

Data and Analysis

Increase transparency of government agency data by making FOIL requests and analyzing the data. To see data that backup our concerns of oversaturation

Want to learn more about us? Here are our 150+ members, our 3 founders, and our contact info.

How can you help? Please donate, volunteer, and signup for our newsletter.

RECENT POSTS

  • 2023 City Council Candidate Forum
    Many thanks for 400+ attendees to our city council candidate forum with Inez Dickens, Yusef…
  • CBS coverage of oversaturation
    Thank you Jessi Mitchell from CBS for helping to raise awareness of the excessive density…
  • Sign Our Petition For Community Harm Reduction
    Greater Harlem Coalition just launched a petition on Change.org: www.Change.org/CommunityHarmReduction The petition requests that New York State’s Assembly and Senate Members should reject The Safer Consumption Act, bill s399/a338 to legalize the safe consumption site on 125th Street, unless the following 6 Safety Guardrails are added to the bill

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