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By Roy Bhusia. |
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New York, July 01, 2005: Liberty Avenue has become a beehive of non-stop commercial activities over the years. A repetitive pattern in business types can be observed as one walks down Liberty Avenue. Over the years Liberty Avenue has become the heartthrob of the Guyanese community. Richmond Hill is now known as little Guyana. The pattern of development saw the mostly Irish and Italian immigrants & businesses move out as their places were rapidly taken by mainly Guyanese immigrants and subsequently Trinidadians and South Asians. The Guyanese business epicenter started between 124 and 125 streets and radiated outwards towards Van Wyck to the east and Lefferts Blvd to the west. Beyond Lefferts Blvd was considered off limits for a number of years since a large white population still lived there. It was only until around the late 80's when Guyanese started to move to areas beyond Lefferts Blvd. Below is a list of approximately 244 owned West Indian business entities on Liberty Ave between 96th st and the Van Wyck Expressway (40 blocks), the majority being owned by Guyanese. This list does not take into consideration all the other West Indian owned businesses located on the side streets and Avenues parallel to Liberty Avenue.
24 99 cents
stores2 Accountants
2 Architects
1 Auto parts
3 Auto Sales
5 Bakery stores
19 Barber shops
15 Bars
1 Church
3 Dentists
1 Disco Club
16 Doctors
1 Electrical repair
1 Furniture store
21 Grocery stores
1 Hardware store
1 Insurance
15 Jewelery
5 Law offices
3 Liquor store
2 Mandir
1 Masjid
2 Media outlets
5 Motgage bankers
10 Music
2 Optical
4 Pharmacies
1 Printing
18 Real estate
29 Restaurants
18 Sari clothing
2 Shipping
2 Taxi
8 Travel agencies
Years ago Liberty Avenue was nothing like it is today. A small influx of Guyanese migrated to the area during the sixties and seventies and paved the way for many more as the years went by. The political un-stability of Guyana and lack of real sustained growth and progress has forced many more Guyanese in the recent years to flee Guyana by any means possible, many of them ending up in Richmond Hill making it a home away from home. These new Guyanese brought with them many of their customs and practices whether good or bad, and not having to adapt like their predecessors did, continued on with some of their lawless behavior. For example at the corner of Lefferts Blvd and Liberty Avenue has begun to look like Stabroek Market Car park with many Guyanese drivers doing illegal part time taxi business with their personal cars to make ends meet, and to help pay for that recently bought home.
Huge strategically
placed billboards focus on prominent businessmen in the real
estate community such as Ed Ahmad advertising his real estate
services. Unfortunately there is an overcrowding & housing
crisis in the area. This has led to many single-family homes
being converted to two family homes where basements and attics
are increasingly being occupied by tenants. Overcrowding has
become a problem, this is a double-edged sword, on one hand it
increases demand for electricity, water, parking space, traffic
lights, garbage collection and other services and affects quality
of life. On the other hand it provides affordable housing for
poor immigrants and income to new home owners to help pay their
high mortgages. Also it continues to provide critical mass for
real estate agencies and other businesses to target. The bottom
line is, zoning regulations are violated and safety is compromised
when these types of illegal conversions take place to accommodate
a population density, which the community was not originally
planned for.Schools have subsequently become over crowed requiring the need for two sessions to accommodate the increase in students. New housing units are in demand and relatively few are being built by the housing authority because of the density of the area and lack of land space. What is frequently happening is, old houses are bought by contractors affiliated with Real Estate brokers, demolished and in turn two to three housing units are built on the same land space. As a result of supply and demand in the area, the cost of housing has gone up tremendously and has become quite a lucrative market for real estate brokers and investors feeding on the new immigrant population.
Schenectady
Mayor Albert Jurczynski of Schenectady has tried to capitalize on this overcrowding problem in Richmond Hill by enticing Guyanese immigrants to come live in Schenectady, which is located in upstate New York. In his quest to bring more Guyanese to Schenectady, he has latched on to two proven facts about the Guyanese immigrants. They love rum and they love cricket, he promised to build a cricket stadium in Schenectady when 50,000 Guyanese have moved there, this statement was made at a roundtable meeting with the business community in between a few drinks, El Dorado 15 year old was the rum of choice.
As a result many businessmen in the Richmond Hill community have teamed up with the Mayor of Schenectady to help attract Guyanese to go live in the area. Mortgage Broker Herman Singh facilitates this by using chartered buses taking Guyanese to see the area on weekends. Herman Singh also has a radio program, which promotes Schenectady to the Guyanese community. Kawal Totaram a lawyer in Richmond Hill is also affiliated with the Mayor in helping to relocate Guyanese. Totaram has not bought any properties in Schenectady as yet but has underwritten mortgages for Guyanese who have.
Now let us "back track" just a bit and look at some data on migration patterns obtained from New York City Department of City Planning.
Migration patterns
The top six countries with the highest immigrant population in New York City as of year 1990 were:
1. Dominican Republic 225,017
2. China - 160,399
3. Jamaica - 116,128
4. Korea - 98,868
5. USSR - 80,815
6. Guyana - 76,150
The top six countries with the highest immigrant population in New York City as of year 2000 were:
| 1. Dominican Republic - 369,186 | Country pop. 8,950,034 |
| 2. China - 261,551 | Country pop. 1,306,313,812 |
| 3. Jamaica - 178,992 | Country pop. 2,731,832 |
| 4. Guyana - 130,647 | Country pop. 765,283 |
| 5. Mexico - 122,550 | Country pop. 106,202,903 |
| 6. Ecuador - 114,944 |
Notice Guyana has jumped from #6 in 1990 to #4 in 2000 showing a tremendous increase in population migrating legally from Guyana. It is interesting to note Guyana has the smallest country population of the countries in the top six. This shows Guyana is unable to provide an environment of growth and prosperity for its population. Those who can, have to migrate to get the opportunities for growth and prosperity. It is believed that to date there are over 200,000 Guyanese in the Richmond Hill area alone. The population growth from 1990 to 2000 was 54,497, below are the settlement patterns for these recent immigrants from Guyana. This also provides good fodder for the real estate market and various cricket teams.
Most of these migrating
Guyanese of Indian origin settle in Queens:Richmond Hill - 17,600
South Ozone Park - 8,600
Woodhaven Ozone Park - 7,200
Most of these migrating Guyanese of African origin settle in Brooklyn:
Flatbush - 5,500
East Flatbush - 5,800
Crown Heights - 4,800
The socioeconomic characteristics of Guyanese in New York City:
% not English proficient - 3.1%
% High School Graduates - 65.4%
Average workers per household - 1.5
Median household income - $41,960
% in poverty - 13.4%
The majority of Guyanese immigrants with respect to industry work in Manufacturing, Construction and in Service industries. The largest employer in New York's economy is Educational, Health and Social Services in fields such as hospitals, elementary and secondary schools, home health care, nursing facilities, colleges and universities. Guyanese are underrepresented in Public Administration.
Real Estate dynamics
Guyanese migrants view land and property as a means of social and economic mobility. The Guyanese immigrant whilst living in a basement, attic or sharing an apartment with other extended family members are constantly bombarded with advertisements in the free community newspapers and community television shows. Ads stating they can buy a house for zero dollars down, low mortgage rates. The new immigrant jumps at the prospect of homeowner ship and the American dream. Some of them are able to buy their own home in the span of five years either on their own or with the help of family. Some on the other hand become victims of predatory lending whereby they are not able to pay their mortgages and their homes end up in foreclosure.
Below is a list of free newspapers and the % of Real Estate Ads targeted at the Richmond Hill Community, these free newspapers can be picked up at Grocery stores, Real Estate offices, Bars and Restaurants.
| Free Paper | Pages | Real Esate ads | % of ads to pages |
| Carib Sun | 24 | 6 | 25% |
| Caribbean Daylight | 76 | 35 | 46% |
| The West Indian | 68 | 31 | 46% |
| Cricket International | 40 | 3 | 8% |
| Global News | 32 | 9 | 28% |
| Caribbean New Yorker | 68 | 24 | 35% |
| Kaieteur News | 40 | 7 | 18% |
| The Careibbean Voice | 44 | 7 | 15% |
Below is a sample list of television shows and the time dedicated to ads versus content. These shows were aired on Saturday 8/27/2005 on Time Warner Cable ITV Channel 503 from 8:00 am to 9:30 am. Also a rating is given on the right, (1) being extremely poor and (10) being excellent. There are numerous shows like this which are sponsored by Real Estate and Mortgage brokers to attract a relatively unsophisticated target audience who are still taken up with the Bollywood song & dance entertainment as they were accustomed to back home.
Unless you are interested in buying a house, spare your self the torture and go buy yourself a DVD music video for $5 dollars, available in bootleg at the numerous Music shops on Liberty Ave. Original might cost you $10 - $15 dollars.
Cricket dynamics
Cricket is known as a gentleman's sport and played to the highest possible standards. Today in Guyana these standards are maintained, a lot of discipline, dedication and sacrifice are made by players who want to make something of themselves in Cricket. Players in Guyana unfortunately have to give up their education to pursue a career in cricket with the hope of getting on the National team or more importantly getting an overseas contract whereby they would be able to migrate. Now let me "backtrack" to New York, during the 80's cricket was played by mostly older educated Guyanese who were looking for a social outlet and a way of maintaining tradition by playing these friendly matches on whatever grounds were available. Softball cricket competition at that time was non-existent in New York.
Fast track to year 2005 and the scene has changed tremendously in certain areas but has remained stagnant in others, hardball cricket has expanded and softball cricket has become extremely prevalent. There are more teams today as a result of migration and there are less grounds as a result of not having Guyanese or other West Indians in Public Administration who could lobby for such grounds.
Today in the New York hardball league there are 140 teams in 8 distinct leagues playing cricket on about 15 grounds. Each league has its own organizations with every league pulling in a different direction. There obviously has to be some financial gain to be made by forming separate leagues.
-American cricket league
-Brooklyn cricket league
-Commonwealth cricket league
-Eastern American cricket league
-New York cricket league
-New York Nassau cricket league
-Metropolitan cricket league
-Bangladeshi cricket league.
The softball cricket league has about 53 teams and play on grounds, which are separate from hardball cricket grounds. Sometimes two matches have to be played simultaneously on one ground to accommodate the teams.
But not withstanding the whole dynamics of the game has changed, it is no longer a gentleman's sport in New York and it wouldn't be surprising to see umpires on occasion being chased with a cutlass or bat. Umpires who, incidentally might not get paid if they don't make favorable decisions. Big stakes are involved these days, it is more of a commercial enterprise where the team manager who has the most money would most likely win the major competitions.
Many business owners are able to bring in overseas players and pay them each $5,000 to $10,000 dollars to play a couple of games for their team, teams are able to acquire visas for such players. One such business owner was able to afford to fly in good players from the Caribbean and Canada just so that he would be able to open the batting and the bowling. This business owner is now wearing an ankle bracelet and is on a hiatus in Florida. This is the enticement that many prospective cricket players in Guyana hear about and are willing to sacrifice for since opportunities are not available in other avenues.
Betting on games has become prevalent in New York, team managers bet as much as $10,000 dollars on softball games. The players on the winning team will earn about $100 and up depending on their skill and performance that day. This is a lucrative deal for some and a way to make some extra cash, but is this good for the game and is it legal?
Conclusion
If one were to read the sponsorship labels on team uniforms you would most likely see Real Estate names, Sports Bars or Restaurants, with the majority of the teams being sponsored by Real Estate companies because that is where the cash flow is plentiful for obvious reasons. Cricket in the New York region is mired in controversy and lack of cooperation amongst the parties involved to take it to the next level where corporate sponsorship will be good for the game. Cricket in New York is an efficient means for business to target potential customers. That is why Ahmad Group of Companies is sponsoring the Caribbean Cup in New York (Former Red Stripe Cup) because he realizes the potential of exposure that traditional advertising dollars cannot purchase. In the mean time the others need to continue advertising in the free newspapers and television infomercials disguised as song and dance shows to try and capture their market share.
Only two publications are worthy of reading if you are not interested in buying a house, Cricket International & The Caribbean Voice.