14 THE QUEENS COURIER • APRIL 15, 2021 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM
Local artists host uplifting fundraiser for
families displaced by Jackson Heights fi re
BY ANGÉLICA ACEVEDO
aacevedo@schnepsmedia.com
@QNS
Community artists and residents gathered
in Travers Park on Saturday, April 10,
for an aft ernoon of dance, art and treats
— all to benefi t the hundreds of families
who were displaced by a massive fi re at a
nearby apartment building.
Kaleidospace, a Queens-based arts collective,
hosted the event to fundraise for
the GoFundMecreated on behalf of the
89-07 34th Ave. building’s tenants association,
89th Street Tenants Unidos. Th e
funds will go toward the 240 families of
the six story, 133-unit apartment building
who lost their homes as a result of
an eight-alarm fi re that broke out on
Tuesday, April 6.
“We just really want to be able to supply
everything that we can with the love
that we have for our community by using
art and our voices to uplift the people
that need it the most,” said Kaleidospace
founder Manuela Agudelo. “Th ese are
essential workers. Th ese are low-income
communities of color who are just like us,
and they deserve our love.”
Agudelo was one of the performers,
captivating the several dozen attendees
with her Cumbia dance as Maraca Bruja,
a Colombian band, kicked off the event
with their Afro-Indigenous music.
Many of the artists and organizers at the
event have been on the ground collecting
donations and supplies for the families
who were displaced by the fi re.
Community activist Daniel Puerto, who
created the GoFundMe on behalf of the
tenants association and has organized
additional relief eff orts, said that although
they met their initial goal of $250,000,
“the need is higher.”
“To put it into context, there are more
than 400 people who have been displaced,”
Puerto said, explaining that
many units housed more than one family.
“$250,000 is not enough.”
He added that the tenants association
will distribute the funds among the families
who were placed in hotels, shelters
and other homes across the city. Th e families
aff ected by
the fi re will
have to register
with the
Department
of Housing
Preservation to receive housing
services, including hotel extensions past
April 13.
Mark Saldana, an artist and organizer
with Kaleidospace, had family living in
the building. He said that luckily, his family
members, including one cousin who is disabled,
were rushed out of their apartment
before anyone got hurt as a result of the fi re.
“Th ere were a lot of people in there,
and all of them lost everything,” Saldana
said, adding that they lost some pets and
important documents. “But I’m so happy
that my whole family is safe.”
Th e fi re fi rst broke out inside an apartment
on the building’s sixth fl oor on
Tuesday aft ernoon, and later spread into
a small section of the next door building,
according to the FDNY. It took 12 hours
and more than 300 fi refi ghters to bring
the fi re under control.
Six residents and 64 fi refi ghters were
injured by the
fl ames, with most
of the injuries
reported as non-life-threatening,
according to the FDNY.
Fire marshals have not yet entered
the building to determine what
caused the fi re, but they say it
isn’t suspicious. According to the
FDNY, there was a delay in calling 911
and the door of the apartment where the
fi re originated was left open, causing the
fi re to spread to the hallway.
Almost immediately aft er the fi re, many
community members in Jackson Heights
organized aid for the tenants.
Agudelo said Kaleidospace was able to
raise $1,000 in a day to give some of the
families gift cards. Saldana worked with
the NYC Brown Berets to collect and distribute
clothing, and said he was encouraged
to see how neighbors quickly united
to help the families not only with donations,
but also to understand the information
they were given by the Red Cross.
“It’s been a rough, rough week,” Saldana
said. “I’m so glad the community just
stuck together and pulled through to help
these families in the past few days.”
While Saturday’s event featured multiple
dance and artistic performances, it
also had tables set up with print and photography
pieces made by local artists on
sale, including Eric Teran of City Prints
NYC and Jorge Pardo Denning of Sine
Shooter.
Parva Bakeshop
and Cafe, located
at 8201 Northern
Blvd., donated pastries
and teas, while Sulcet
Perez of Suceltlicious Sweets off ered
chocolate bars and cake pops.
Perez, who also performed, commended
Kaleidospace for bringing
the community together.
“We’re just here to help everybody
and make sure everybody has
a home aft er this,” Perez said.
Th e Jackson Heights Community
Fridge was also there with a food drive
to collect non-perishable items for the
fridge and the families. Organizers
Tahia Islam and Amy Pinilla talked
about how they’re all connected in
their mutual aid eff orts.
“Th e best way we could take part as
the community fridge is to make sure
we’re a vessel to collect food for them
once they’re all settled and also to keep
it in the refrigerator for the rest of our
community,” Islam said.
Andrew Sokolof Diaz, co-president of
89th Street Tenants Unidos, said they are
“immensely grateful” for Kaleidospace’s
support and their use of art as a way to heal.
“It means much more than just supporting
our families, this is for our families
to rebuild,” Sokolof Diaz said. “We’ve
been decimated by this at a very critical
moment. It’s a crossroads because these
are immigrant people, these are essential
workers in our buildings, and now is
the time to see what the city does next for
us. We’re grateful that the community has
had our backs.”
Photos by Gabriele
Holtermann
Artists and vendors
came together for
a fundraiser hosted
by Queens arts
collective Kaleidospace
for the victims of the
Jackson Height fi re.
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