Manhattan’s prime prosecutor confirmed off his portray expertise at Washington Sq. Park this week in a weird bid to “heal” town, whereas drug addicts nodded off throughout.
Gentle-on-crime District Legal professional Alvin Bragg was noticed by The Submit brush in hand, misplaced in a watercolor sketch, as a part of his “art of healing” July workshop collection.
The selection of location was no coincidence — the northwest nook of the park has spiraled right into a wicked drug den, with syringes littering the bottom and zombies capturing up on park benches and beneath bushes.
“We want to take back the park and make it available for those who live and visit the area to do things like the artwork we were just doing, you know listen to music, enjoy the park,” Bragg informed The Submit.
“It’s very intentional to pick that part of the park which has had some challenges,” Bragg, who was there for about an hour along with his entourage and fielded questions from a handful of neighborhood members, added.
The DA’s workplace has been placing on these taxpayer-funded summer season artwork workshops yearly – in previous years specializing in gun violence.
“It’s absolutely baffling,” fumed Trevor Sumner, Greenwich Village resident and president of the Washington Sq. Affiliation.
“The whole thing is an utter farce. To have the guy who’s most responsible for the rampant drug use, mental illness and violence in the park come here to gaslight the entire neighborhood like it doesn’t exist. It’s infuriating.”
Moments earlier than Bragg started portray a tree in watercolor, town’s drug disaster blossomed in actual time a couple of ft away.
Law enforcement officials tried to revive a glassy-eyed junkie slumped on a bench — and staff from the nonprofit Drug Coverage Alliance have been seen covertly slipping free syringes to addicts.
The needles are a part of so-called “harm reduction kits” the $13 million pro-drug non-profit touts on-line.
They arrive full with drug paraphernalia that features syringes, alcohol wipes, cotton, tourniquets and cookers, in accordance with the group.
It’s unclear how lengthy the group – which was based in 1994 with funding from far left-billionaire George Soros and lobbied for marijuana legalization – has been working within the junkie-filled part of the park.
Soros is the Drug Coverage Alliance’s chief donor and former chairman. His son Alex Soros nonetheless sits on its board.
The group, which mentioned its philosophy is about “meeting people where they are,” declined to remark.
Hurt discount allows addicts to shoot up quite than getting them to give up, critics have charged.
“The idea is that people should only seek treatment when they’re ready. But most people addicted to drugs are addicted for their whole lives,” Charles Fane Lehmann, a fellow on the Manhattan Institute, lately informed The Submit.
“They often regard efforts to get people into treatment . . . as actively hostile to the interests of people who use drugs.”
In the meantime, the NYPD’s Sixth Precinct continues to arrest the park’s common half a dozen sellers — most of whom are launched shortly after.
“No one should feel comfortable selling drugs in the West Village, especially Washington Square Park,” cops posted this week after one other bust.
A file 471 narcotics arrests have been made within the precinct alone to this point this yr, up 68% from a yr in the past, in accordance with NYPD information.
