westchester square

Place Based Art Related Economic Development Comes to Westchester Square

Based on our success in the South Bronx Cultural Corridor, The Bronx Council on the Arts has been invited to bring our placed based economic development strategies to the Northeast Bronx. We are busy creating alliances between the local community, politicians, artists, and regional audiences to make Westchester Square a destination.  With local partners and stakeholders, BCA is developing a balanced  and creative economic development strategy that mines the unique assets of the Square to benefit long time businesses and residents as well as those that are newly arrived. For example,  BCA staff is becoming familiar with local space concerns and ideas for creative re-use and new development possibilities.  Staff is  actively investigating collaborative possibilities and new ways to offer local residents and art entrepreneurs access to technical assistance for financial literacy, mortgages, tax issues and personal health and stress issues. We understand that Westchester Square is a unique place to live and do business and we are working to help keep creative industry, merchants and residents in the area.

The Westchester Square area is rich in assets. It is a transportation hub, a historically significant area, a border between high and low density Bronx neighborhoods, and it is an area welcoming new residents and immigrant populations such as Pakistanis, Koreans, and Central Americans as business owners and home owners.

Since 2009 the Bronx Council on the Arts has creatively worked with Bronx artists of many disciplines and scheduled a variety of arts events for local residents and merchants to increase pedestrian traffic for Westchester Square businesses, to attract new high-end businesses while providing revenue generating opportunities and exposure for artists. 

Summer 2010

Bronx Council on the Arts and the Hutchinson Metro Center co-sponsor three lunchtime concerts at the Metro Café for employees and students on the 42 acre development site. During the concerts, bronxArtworks® products will be available for sale.

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Culture, Commerce, and Community

The Bronx Council on the Arts and the BCA Development Corporation is using arts and culture as the tools to help attract new residents, customers, businesses and new positive attention to the Square.

Since December 2009 the Bronx Council on the Arts has co-sponsored:

• The 2nd Annual Fair @ The Square with Bronx Culture Trolley Saturdays.
  
  
• Free artisan workshops for families on Saturdays at the Huntington Free Library — such as The Elegant Art of Knot Tying and Story in a Recycled Bottle. View the complete 2009-2010 series.
  
  

• MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS, a free professional development series geared towards local artist/entrepreneurs, designed to help emerging creative industry members to identify competition, develop a comprehensive business plan, obtain financing and develop a marketing strategy, at the Bronx Business Alliance.
  
  
  
• The 2010 “Floetry” — Poetry In Motion Slams, the fourteenth annual Bronx WritersCorps Youth Poetry slams in which the borough’s most talented teen poets compete to become the best slam team in the Bronx at the Owen Dolen Recreational Center.
  
  
• Free professional development workshops for emerging writers through BCA's Bronx Writers Center at the Westchester Square branch of the New York Public Library, and also at the Huntington Free Library.
  
  

• Free community events and holiday celebrations, including Kwanzaa, Three Kings Day, and Mother's Day.
  

Local children enjoying the Kwanzaa celebration 

at the Square’s Owen Dolen Center

what's next?

The Bronx Council on the Arts will provide cultural information services and  plan for an arts and commerce calendar to help develop potential customers in the Square.

• Facilitate a concert performance series in alternative spaces in the Square such as the historic Owen Dolen plaza, a widely cherished component of the area
  
  
• Consider the sidewalks adjacent to Owen Dolen Park as distinct public space and pathways
  to public art and areas for public interaction
  
  
• Find and use vacant spaces as phantom galleries
  
  
• Schedule a regular series of multi-disciplinary arts demonstrations, and community arts events featuring local artists and artisans
  
  
• Expand programming at BCA’s Bronx Writers Center
  
  

 

 

Phantom Gallery at Westchester Square’s former WaMu building, May 2010.

 

key Stakeholders in the area

Association of Merchants and Business Professionals of Westchester Square

Our mission is the stabilization, commercial revitalization & economic growth of the commercial corridor, and the surrounding community, of Westchester Square.

Bronx Business Alliance

The Bronx Business Alliance is a nonprofit multi-service business development corporation dedicated to revitalizing the commercial corridors in the northeast Bronx.

Bronx Underground

The Bronx Underground is a DIY (do it yourself) booking and promotions company based in the Bronx, NYC.

The East Bronx History Forum

The East Bronx History Forum meets monthly to discuss our Bronx history.

The Huntington Free Library

The Huntington Free Library and Reading Room
9 Westchester Square 
Bronx, New York 
718-829-7770

Hutchinson Metro Center

The Hutchinson Metro Center is a new office complex in a beautiful 42-acre landscaped suburban campus setting.

New York City Council Member James Vacca

District Office:
3040 East Tremont Ave.
Room 104
Bronx, New York 10461

Westchester Square / Zerega Improvement Org

WSZIO is a 501(C)4 nonprofit corporation founded in September 1990 by a group of Westchester Square parents with young children, who over the years learned to become grassroots community activists in response to what we perceived to be major issues that affected the lives of our children, neighbors, and friends.