The ward/councilman is Michael Yun who is oblivious to everything around him. It seems his sole purpose is to be a thorn in the new Mayors side by voting no on all new citywide proposals.

He has yet to address this issue and is never seen in our neighborhood. He rarely leave his storefront on Central
Avenue and would have a hard time finding Palisades Avenue on a map.

Lots of good suggestions! IMO, this sounds like an issue that can motivate people - Jcpaddy has already penned a letter to City Hall. To take it a step further, should there be a larger letter writing campaign? Outreach by one of the Community Groups?

While I work for an NYC Agency, I'm not up on JC politics - what is the Ward/Councilman's role in this?

Broken window theory is perfect here.

If the city wants to "tag" these buildings with the red abandoned building signs, the city should also clean up the graffiti.

And 1stGuy -- don't try to buy next to one of these abandoned properties. Many lenders will deny your request. If the lenders don't, the home owners insurance will deny you or destroy your bank account.

Thanks to all who replied to this post and who care about our neighborhood.

Please see the below letter that I personally sent off to Mayor Fulop this morning concerning the egregious ignoring of the destruction of Palisades Avenue and the Heights in general.
This is just the beginning. We will not go down without a fight!

Letter:
January 2014.

Mayor Steven Fulop
City Hall
Jersey City, NJ 07302

Sir,

This letter is in regards to the absolute epidemic of graffiti tagging that is going on in our city, especially up in the Heights where I currently live. The area of Palisades Avenue from South St. down to Booraem (the area now zoned for restaurants and artists working space) has been destroyed by graffiti vandals. Absolutely nothing has been done to stop its spread. Outside of a few people and myself who paint over this mess, the problem is getting worse.

Lest we forget, Mayor Guiliani started his process of cleaning up New York City by first and foremost, dealing with the quality of life issues for it?s citizens. Getting rid of squeagy cleaners, panhandlers and cleaning up the graffiti. Why is this such a difficult thing to accomplish by anyone in this, and all previous administrations?

My question is: What can be done?
Issue #1:
Having to get permission from a buildings owner to take the graffiti off the building is absurd. Many of these building are owned by slumlords who do not care and will NEVER respond to your queries. The other half are owned by people who do not live here and only care about the income these buildings provide. They too will not respond. Going on the premise of the current rule, NOTHING will get done. The graffiti will stay on these building forever.
This is absolutely UNACCEPTABLE!!
An ordinance needs to be set forth for the city to take the graffiti off as it deems fit. Permission or no permission.
Our quality of life is being destroyed up here along with our property values.
The eastern side of the Heights is looking like a ghetto. It never was and never will be.

One of the focal center pieces of the Heights is Fisk park which is now encompassed by dilapidated buildings COVERED in graffiti. This is unacceptable. How do you expect to get a better class of working people to encompass our city when one of our showcases of the neighborhood is surrounded by such filth?
Have someone come up here and clean this mess up!

Issue #2:
Police presence? As usual in the Heights, virtually non existent. How some of these thugs were able to tag an entire bubble tag on 3 storefronts on our MAIN street and not be seen or stopped by anyone is beyond comprehension. Peoples personal homes are being tagged. They are tagging on a main st. in the middle of a busy roadway and nothing. This has been going on for months without a single arrest.
It will not stop.

Issue #3:
Shop owner accountability?
Lets set forth a new law that these shop owners must burden some of the responsibility of cleaning graffiti off of their property. Every shutter gate on Palisades Avenue from South St. to Booraem has been tagged. Is it too much to ask the owner of the business to buy a $3 can of spray paint and paint over the tag? And while we?re at it, is it too much to ask them to sweep in front of their business as well?

Issue # 4
CCTV - We need it on Palisades Ave. Just one camera by Fisk park on the corner of Bowers and Palisades or Franklin and Palisades would be a deterrent to these animals. Things are being re-tagged the minute they are painted over. I understand the police have bigger issues to deal with, but for those of us who live in this neighborhood, our quality of life is being destroyed. The police are catching no one.

Personally, I have made it a personal crusade to keep a 4 block radius around my house clean of such filth. I have cleaned up, painted over and scrubbed off every piece of graffiti on buildings, lamp post and garages that encompass Webster, Ravine, Ferry and New York Ave. I have spent well over $200 on paint, spray paint, spray paint remover and tape in the spirit of doing the right thing.

I am a 25 year veteran of this city and this neighborhood and have never seen such disregard for other peoples property or the neighborhood as a whole. Police presence is minimal at best and these animals are doing all this tagging and dumping with such impunity it?s unsettling. This is a great neighborhood to live in. I love it here, but right now, we need some help.

I think I speak for many Heights residence when I say we feel as if our part of the city is being vastly ignored. All the buildings going up downtown, restaurants, new business?s, etc. We simply ask that these quality of life issues in the Heights start getting paid some attention.

I?m someone who campaigned for you, gave money to your campaign and honestly believed change was on the way. I just didn?t think it would be for the worse in my neighborhood.

Mr. Mayor, it would be a nice gesture on our part if you came up to Palisades Avenue to view this destruction for yourself. I would certainly relish the opportunity to show you around all the side streets that have become a haven for graffiti and filth as well.
I would appreciate it very much if you replied back to this letter.

Please don't do anything to help improve the area/housing prices until AFTER I buy my apt please!

Looking at Google Earth -- I can see that Palisade Avenue is going uphill from anywhere around it.

Quote:

Agreed. The R1 default is a disaster for most of the city. It brought the plague of ugly pink brick facade 2 family condos.

Would that "bake lane" be cupcake friendly?

One thing that could help is changing the direction of the street to one way, along with Summit. Once changed could be wide enough to allow for better commercial spaces. Now I'm no planner but roads that allow for bigger vehicles, namely trucks. Walnut street is a one way street for about 2 or 3 miles and is one of the most prosperous streets in the US. Obviously Palisade won't become that popular but I am just referencing it since I know there will be someone who will argue it will be hurtful to businesses.

Also it could allow for a dedicated bake lane that would virtually cost the city very little.

My $0.02 to improve things:

Rezone the blighted areas. The R-1 zoning makes it really difficult to build affordable rentals. Some of the more marginal buildings might be torn down and replaced with new construction if a higher density is allowed.

I guess the question should be what specific suggestions can be made to Councilman Yun, rather than complaints? You can make people remove graffiti but you can't make them buy and reno buildings or open businesses, you need to make it inviting.

One that comes to my mind, as someone who doesn't live there but is there frequently, is that there should be metered parking in the higher commercial density areas. Who wants to open a business in an area that is hostile to customers in cars? Sure, it's a walkable area, but not everyone who might be a patron is in walking distance. I've had to pass by restaurants in various areas of JC where I would have stopped for lunch while driving errands, but there was no place to park.

The abandoned/foreclosed real estate needs to be sold and developed if it hasn't been already. It bugs me to no end that our gorgeous building is right next door to an abandoned home.

We live right in this stretch (agree on the beauty of the views and the park) and the disheartening thing is that the responsible condos (the ones that have actually beautified their fronts etc.) will be right next door to the rundown and abandoned buildings. You probably wouldn't even notice the nice ones because of the a) garbage on the streets b) graffiti and c) abandoned buildings that are totally out of control.

That said, something is going on in 431 Palisade-it's the red brick one with the fish painted on it with the windows covered up with paper just like ModCup's were until recently. I peeked in the windows walking home and I can see people working in there refinishing it and it is beautiful. There is a full exposed brick wall...maybe it's going to be a restaurant or something.

The Riverview community association is aware of the problem. I think it's supposed to be one of the priorities for the coming year.

First impressions count. We were surprised by how high end everything was in our condo building (nice appliances, super nice floors, beautiful interior with slate and glass tile etc. etc.) because we judged it by the original facade-they finally updated it in November and it looks lovely now. Whoever owns Van Vorst Farmhouse lives under a perma-cover of rotting leaves...there's just a lot of variation in how much people care about their real estate compared to Ogden Avenue.

I don't get why there's garbage on the JC stretch of Palisade day in and day out when you cross the border to Union City and it's much cleaner and less sketchy looking.

(still like the neighborhood and love our home, but yes, agreed that it looks a bit downtrodden over here)

Yes. Ever since they put those red signs on the buildings it's been a green light for graffiti "artists" or taggers or whatever it is. It looks horrible. I agree. And I hate being down on the Heights as I love this neighborhood but something has to be done about this main thoroughfare. It looks like garbage.

Maybe if they cleaned up some of the facades and moved up to the 21st century the area would not look so decadent. Also getting rid of some of the indigent residents would help as well.

Took the #87 Bus to Hoboken PATH this AM (I usually go into WTC via Journal Square in the morning) and saw the stretch from Franklin to Congress Streets in the daylight for the first time in a long while. What a nightmare! Every 3rd building seemingly vacant, with one of those red signs; lots of buildings for sale; more vacant storefronts than ever... You are so close to million$ views of Manhattan, but other than the new Coffee Shop, it really seems Palisade Avenue is going downhill faster and faster (all 4 storefronts at the corner of Franklin and Congress are vacant).

The rezone to allow more restautants seemed promising at the time, and maybe it will take time, but what do people think? Not enough people with $$$ to support new businesses? Is it the general seediness that scares business owners away, and could the city do something?