CIty Council representative Carmen De La Rosa joins Led and Octavio on the Uptown Voices podcast for a wide ranging conversation.

In this episode we learn about her origins as a daughter of immigrants who grew up on Post Avenue in Inwood, the northern-most neighborhood of Manhattan Island. She also discusses the state of the Uptown community (District 10) and what needs to happen as the Executive Branch of the US government focuses its threats on our neighbors. You'll also hear about the impact of On Point, safe injection site (that was approved for operations at midnight, the last night of the De Blasio administration as power transitioned to Eric Adams) and the challenge of the addiction, mental health and housing crises which our neighborhood has been shouldering.

Councilwoman De La Rosa is proud of her work and praises her staff for its grit and determination to help members of the district she represents to navigate the myriad of issues they bring to her office. Her hope is that the responsiveness she show to her constituents will be her legacy.

Join us for this eye opening conversation on Uptown Voices!

@artbydario draws vibrant scenes celebrating life in the beloved Uptown neighborhood where he grew up. His images are vibrant representations of what many of us walk past everyday, sometimes without noticing, or at the very least, taking for granted the characters that exist in the background of our lives.

Ruben Dario, named after a Nicaraguan poet, never takes the small details for granted and brings forward the images, people and objects that make up the wallpaper of our existence. Dario takes the mundane aspects of our lives, infuses them with Dominican imagery, and places them on a pedestal so that they can be honored .

He discovered his aptitude for drawing at an early age., but never considered a professional career in art. The COVID pandemic changed all that. That's when he decided to leave his successful but unfulfilling sales and banking career to pursue his art professionally.

With the unwavering support of his wife, Rosdaly Ramirez, he's had a number of winning collaborations with the likes of Moleskine, Snipes, Soundcloud, Harper Collins, Converse, Yandel and more. Always highlighting his neighbors and their energy - the superpower of the immigrant in the United States.

Join Led and Octavio in this heartfelt and fun conversation with @artbydario on this episode of Uptown Voices!

Johanna Garcia, a member of the Save Fort Washington Collegiate Church, now rebranded as The Fort Washington Community Church, joins Led and Octavio to discuss what the next steps are for her congregation and to raise awareness about what the ongoing loss of our community spaces means for our neighborhood.

This important episode of Uptown Voices describes latest turn of events in negotiations with the Marble Collegiate Church system which, as of June 30th, has evicted the Fort Washington Community Church from its premises and scrubbed its bylaws of any legal ties it had with the historic congregation that anchored this crucial site in Washington Heights.

As of Tuesday, July 15, we still have no idea what is going to happen with the site. The Collegiate System has not been reachable and its only community-facing announcements are found on its website.

Garcia says that this community, whether one is a member of the congregation or not, must flex its muscle and raise its voice to have a say as to what will ultimately happen to the site.

Certainly, the prominent corner of 181st and Fort Washington Avenue cannot become another of the growing disused and abandoned lots that are currently blighting this neighborhood, she says. Worse still, as the former site of the Coliseum remains abandoned, the blocks between Broadway and Fort Washington Ave. are about to become book-ended by unused prime real estate.

Advocates fighting for this congregation and those who are fighting to improve the quality of life of this community call on residents and elected officials to take a stand. "We’ve reached our limit," they say. The congregation is crushed. Garcia asks, "How is it Christian for a church to evict its poorest and most diverse congregation, which it had promised to help sustain, all because of the poor financial outcomes of decisions made by its overarching church leadership? "

All in all, it raises worrisome concerns about the direction of the institution.

Is the church - which was founded after Dutch Reformed settlers bought the land that eventually became Manhattan from the Lenape in an unfair transaction and whose early clergy also included slaveholders - reverting to its ethnocentric ideology and the financial shell-games of its past, which the church elders had vowed to address and fix in 2020?

All this and more is addressed in this episode of Uptown Voices, available here, and everywhere you listen you tour podcasts.