BY YANNIC RACK | Community Board 4 (CB4) is welcoming two new members this month, and they’ve already set their priorities on how to best help their West Side community.
Liam Buckley, a 16-year-old high school sophomore from Hell’s Kitchen, and Mathew Bergman, a financial attorney from Chelsea, are the newest recruits for the board, which covers the West Side from W. 14th to W. 59th Sts.
Buckley, who goes to the New York City Lab School for Collaborative Studies on W. 17th St., decided to join the board after he got a taste for local politics through last year’s Participatory Budgeting process, where residents vote on projects to be funded through the city’s capital budget, and which gave him a chance to successfully advocate for new bathrooms to be built at his school.
“I decided to join because I was really interested in getting more involved in the community,” Buckley told Chelsea Now this week, adding that he is also part of his student government and a member of the city’s Youth Council.
“It seems like a good way to put my voice through and also get more of a youth perspective, which has been lacking on the board,” he said.
Buckley grew up (and still lives) a block away from the Port Authority Bus Terminal, which is why he said he would keep an extra-close eye on the planned replacement of the transit hub — which some locals fear could obliterate several residential and commercial blocks in the neighborhood.
“My block wouldn’t be touched by the renovations, but a couple of the local businesses that my family goes to could be taken with eminent domain,” he said. “That’s definitely an issue I want to talk about.”
Buckley started attending the board’s meetings a few months ago, whereas Bergman — a 41-year-old financial attorney who has lived in Chelsea for 15 years — has been coming to sessions on and off for a few years.
“Community boards are the eyes and ears of the community, charged with preserving our unique past, and at the same time planting seeds for the future,” he said.
“I wanted to join a few years ago, but I didn’t have the time to commit, and do it right. At this point in my life, I have the time to devote to it and I look forward to getting my hands dirty in many of the local issues facing our neighborhood.”
Bergman said he was especially focused on issues around affordability — whether talking about the need for more low-income housing, retaining the middle class in the area, or preventing the shuttering of beloved small businesses.
“When low, moderate and middle-income individuals can no longer afford to stay in our communities, those communities become less diverse and more transient, and with a disconnected citizenry,” he said, adding that more trials for the neighborhood are also just on the horizon.
“The biggest challenges are yet to come, with the rollout of the huge infrastructure projects potentially slated for the next decade — the Port Authority Bus Terminal renovation, a new Hudson River tunnel, and the Penn Station and Moynihan Station development project,” he noted.
But he also mentioned a recent win for the community: the new park on W. 20th St. (btw. Sixth & Seventh Aves.), for which planning just kicked off last month after years of grassroots community advocacy to realize the project.
“That is virtually unheard of in Manhattan and truly shows you how dedicated the Chelsea community is,” Bergman said.
Eighty-one new community board members were appointed by Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer last month — more than a quarter of the 312 appointments across the borough — and the new appointees will serve for two years.
Buckley will actually be the youngest current member of the board, and one of only six under-18-year-olds appointed in Manhattan in this cycle (six others were appointed last year, the first year 16- and 17-year-olds were allowed to join).
CB4 chair Delores Rubin said there was likely little training required for the two new members — who attended their first full board meeting on May 4 — since they have both been involved with the board and local politics before.
“Liam has kept very much active through the Youth Council through [City Councilmember] Corey Johnson’s office, and Matt has been to a lot of our meetings and has spoken during public sessions,” she said. “So both have already shown that they’re ready to go.”
She added that, even though the many members staying on for another term are greatly appreciated, Buckley and Bergman would hopefully spice up the monthly sessions with their own insights and perspectives.
“We’re especially excited that we keep the continuity of our long-time members, but it’s also great to have some additional voices,” she said.
“These two are at the very ends of the spectrum, we have a seasoned citizen, as well as someone very young, and I think it’s going to be an interesting dynamic that will bring at least some good debate.”
