The following is an extended version of the story that appears in our latest edition.

District 15 City Council Member Oswald Feliz (C.D. 15) hosted a town hall Wednesday, April 23, for residents to gather ideas and explore possibilities for the future use of the old Fordham Library building, located at 2556 Bainbridge Avenue in Fordham Manor.

 

The building has remained vacant since 2005 and currently falls under the remit of NYC Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS), according to City officials, having previously fallen under the responsibility of NYC Department of Health & Mental Hygiene from 2008.

 

The town hall was held in the relatively “new” Bronx Library Center, located at 310 East Kingsbridge Road in Fordham Manor, which opened in 2006 to replace the former Fordham Library. The atmosphere, both physically and figuratively, got heated at one point when it appeared there was a problem with the air conditioning inside the Center’s auditorium, frustrating Sirio Guerino of the group, “Guerinos against Graffitti.*”

 

He appeared to suggest that the lack of air conditioning was emblematic of how the City managed redevelopment projects generally and how public money appeared to be mismanaged and/or focused on the wrong priorities in his view (more below). During the intervening 20 years, a bit like the long saga surrounding the redevelopment of the Kingsbridge Armory, the former library building has so far seen several potential proposals fall through, including a community space, an animal shelter, and a 10,200 square-foot computer-based testing and application center (CTAC), to test and apply for for City jobs.

 

The City even held a public hearing in conjunction with DCAS to discuss the latter proposal in 2021, nearly four years ago, as reported. When asked for a status update in 2022, a spokesperson for DCAS told us, “We are continuing to engage with the local elected officials and community members to determine the best use for this space.”

 

Norwood News previously reported in 2013 that because the structure, built in 1923, was designated as eligible for the National Register of Historic Places, any changes to it would have to be approved by the state’s historical preservation office. In recent years, we asked DCAS, among other questions, if that approval had ever been requested and/or received. We didn’t receive a response, have followed up again, and will share any updates we receive. [It’s, of course, possible that such a request might be dependent upon first selecting a definitive project for the building.]

 

About two dozen people showed up for the town hall, where Feliz discussed some of the issues the building has faced since becoming dormant. “As we know, the building was in very bad shape,” the councilman said. “It’s a big priority for me because right now, a building with a lot of possibilities has turned into an eyesore. The building is always covered in graffiti from top to bottom. I have reached out to DSNY (NYC Department of Sanitation) millions of times, and they have cleaned up the graffiti only for a week later, we’re back to square one.”

 

He continued, “But even more than that, it turned into a garbage dumping zone in front of it, also in the back of it, and even has safety issues. We’ve had many cases where individuals break in for all types of things, including drug use.” Norwood News had covered an unconfirmed report of a break-in in January 2024, when the building was seemingly being used to house migrants illegally.

 

Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson, who also attended the town hall, said, “It is honestly shameful that it has been allowed to be dormant the way it has been for close to 20 years, and I know as borough president that if this old library were in other neighborhoods, we would not be having this conversation almost 20 years later. We deserve new opportunities just like everyone else.”

One of the central topics of discussion from both the elected officials and the community was the prospect of potentially demolishing the old building and constructing a new bigger, modern mixed-use one of the community’s choosing. According to Feliz, the current structure is one and a half floors high, but a new building could potentially go up to five floors.

 

Gibson continued, “Because of the age of the building, because of the fact that it has not had any existing and active usage for all these years, the building is not in the best condition. So, there may be a possibility where we have to look at options that may not allow the existing building to remain. We’ve done that before [with] other projects. We’ve demolished, and then we build brand new, and sometimes it’s more cost-effective than it is to renovate an existing building.”

 

Feliz said the potential cost of renovating the existing building would be $80 million, or a second option would be entering the ULURP (Uniform Land Use Review Procedure) process in order to repurpose the building and which would likely mean a private developer or non-profit organization would get involved. He said the community, elected officials, and city agencies could provide input, request changes, or block any new proposal, and typically, any ULURP process takes about a year.

 

Continuing his remarks on the ULURP scenario, Feliz said, “As of right now, the only use of the property is a library. After we decide the future use of the building, and we say, ‘Hey, instead of the library, we want it to be a community center, housing, etc.,’ then we could put the building up for public auction. The highest bidder takes the property, and develops it but throughout that auction process, it would be a somewhat community-driven auction.”

 

Feliz continued, “We can say to any bidder, for example, that they need to commit to doing five stories, and 30% of it needs to be a community center, and the remaining 70% needs to be affordable home ownership.” Gibson repeatedly said she would pursue any avenue the community wanted, adding that choosing a cheaper alternative would likely lead to an easier process, logistically.

 

“Just in my experience in working with the City, I honestly think the best measure is what is most cost-effective,” the borough president said. Feliz later asked residents for a hand-count of whether they would prefer demolishing the building, and building a new one, or if they would prefer to renovate the building instead. A large majority of the hands that went up voted to renovate the building, and almost no hands voted to demolish it.

 

Norwood resident Sirio Guerino, who attended with his wife, Heather Guerino, stressed the importance of preserving Bronx history regardless of cost, saying, “The Bronx has been dumped on for years and the young generation wants to tear everything down and rebuild with new and better things. I want to see this building stay here.”

 

He continued, “I’ve lived here for 70 years, and I watch things change, and I hear about how the City wants to save money because $80 million is too much money. We are in a building that was brand newly built and there’s no air conditioning, and there’s no money before they fix that air conditioner. So when they say to you, ‘tear down, tear down.’ Tear down? You’re tearing down my history, my father’s history. My grandfather fought in World War I.”

 

Sirio said the Bronx Victory Memorial on Mosholu Parkway in Bedford Park was 100 years old this year. “Will anybody lay a wreath down at that statue this time at the Bronx parade?” he asked. “Think about it… I’m sick and tired of beautiful buildings being torn down, churches being torn down, and buildings built on their property. This is the city’s fault for neglecting this building (library) for 25 years. They didn’t put the money in here, the same thing with that armory. I’ll be dead before that [Kingsbridge] armory ever opens up. I want to see this building stay here. I want to see The Bronx stay here.”

 

Sirio added, “For my children, I got a 21 year old out here, and they say, ‘Dad, tell me about the history of everything.’ I said, ‘Back in the day, buildings looked beautiful. People took pride in building a building.’ I’m of Italian heritage My background is sculptures, the statues, architecture. They want to bulldoze, bulldoze, bulldoze, put apartments, builders, let people live on top of this, let people live on top of that. When you make that decision…”

He then said, “You people decide. Me, personally, there’s no PAL (Police Athletic League) in this community here. It’s all the way down Webster Avenue. There’s none up here, and this is the north Bronx. PAL should take over this building. Harmony Hub is on 197th Street; they should take over this building. The youth need this building.”

 

Guerino added, “The youth need this building, foster care parents need this building. There is no advocacy office in the Bronx for foster care parents. Foster care parents don’t have access to lawyers. They have to pay out of pocket if they get sued by the state or the children who get placed in their homes.”

 

He continued, “There’s a lot of things that need to be done before you send in the wrecking balls, before you sell out, because that’s all I hear from both politicians – we want to tear it down. We don’t want to spend $80 million. This city p*sses away money.” Sirio went on to oppose the decision to close Rikers Island jail and open borough-based jails “right next door to you.” For more on that decision, click here.

 

He added, “Put the prison here. Why not? Because you’re in a building, there is no air conditioner in this building. We’re all sweating here. So you people decide what you want to do with it because I’m 70. I ain’t going to the youth center to play basketball. We should start keeping things from our past. We dig up places and we find burial grounds of people who lived in the past, and then everybody’s up in arms. ‘Oh! We got to preserve that and this.’ You have a building here, you have the armory there. They rotted away from people, from neglect. This building here is brand spanking new, and we’re sweating it. Thank you for your time.”

 

Heather, co-founder of Crusaders for Children’s Rights, also advocated for part of the building to be used as an advocacy center for foster parents. The couple foster children. “They definitely need an advocacy center here in that building,” she said. “Foster parents also need help and legal representation, because biological parents have legal representation and the children that are in foster care have legal representation, but unfortunately, the foster parents do not.”

 

On Thursday, May 1, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced that as part of New York City’s balanced $115.1 billion, 2026 fiscal year (FY) executive budget, it is investing $102.8 million in the city’s foster care system. We’ve asked City Hall how and where that allocation will be spent and will share any updates we receive.

 

Edgar Ramos, who serves on Bronx Community Board 7 as the Traffic & Transportation committee chair, shared one of his biggest concerns about the building’s potential use for affordable housing. “A lot of these developers are coming into this area with a big sign in front saying, ‘low-income housing,’ but when you step inside, and try to fill out an application, if you’re not making at least $100,000, they aren’t even looking at your application.”

 

Helene Hartman-Kutnowsky, who is the Bronx Community Board 7 secretary, but who stated that her opinion was solely hers, said, “I think our community has a lot of new housing already; I think we need services. We need a community center, we need offices for our elected officials, for the community board. We need a new senior center, we need daycare. We especially need employment and training for youth.”

 

Robin, another resident, said, “We should have some technical stuff going on in this space. When we talk about jobs, and I think about the future where other kids are learning about robotics, we should have some type of space here where they could come practice using different types of technologies and collaborate with other people and kids.”

Edward Koku, a board of trustees chair at Fordham United Methodist Church, located behind the old Fordham Library building, said, “The building has attracted a bunch of quality-of-life issues to the area. Parishioners and most of the elderly are, actually, scared to come to church because of the building, and just the way people have been using that space.” Koku added, “I’m very glad this conversation has started, and I hope to remain a very active part of it as we go forward.”

 

The town hall concluded with every member who wanted a chance to speak being granted the opportunity to do so. Feliz later told Norwood News he hopes to have the building’s use agreed upon within the next month, adding, “This is the first town hall we’ve held where we hear from everyone, and the information that we received today is the first part of the process.”

 

*Síle Moloney contributed to this story.