Latina leaps to leadership at Ft. Indy houses

Barbara Luray, a longtime leader of the Ft. Independence Houses Tenants’ Association, vividly remembers the era when predominant groups at her housing complex shut out the voices of women and minorities.

In the 1980s, she said, one president of the tenants’ association, then known as the residents’ board, discouraged people like her from speaking.

“He felt that women of color were beneath him and we weren’t allowed to say anything,” she said of the president, whom she referred to as Mr. Barry. “If he said something and I was like, no, no, no, it was a problem.”

That particular form of discrimination ended as white tenants throughout the city’s public housing left and black and Hispanic people became the majority. In 2014, 65.4 percent of residents were Hispanic (a total of 495 people), 31.3 percent were black (237 people) and 3.3 percent were white (25 people), according to stats provided by NYCHA’s department of communications.

Still, Ms. Luray, who is African American, said the recent election of Carmen “Julie” Mercado to succeed her as president of the Ft. Independence Houses Tenants’ Association is a breakthrough for their community. Ms. Mercado, 64, is the first person of Hispanic heritage to occupy the position. 

“She can speak with them,” Ms. Luray said of Ms. Mercado and other Latino residents. “They can come into the office and talk to her about problems that they wouldn’t feel comfortable talking to me about, even if they did have a translator.”

“That’s the good part about it,” added Ms. Luray, who will remain on the tenants’ association as vice president. “She’s for everyone.”

Ms. Mercado moved into the Ft. Independence Houses with her parents in 1988. The retired employee of the state Department of Social Services went on to earn a reputation for two main things: helping other tenants with complicated government forms, and regularly cooking up a storm for all to enjoy.

“They would come to me to fill out forms,” she said during a recent interview in the tenants’ association’s Spartan eighth-floor office in the 3340 Bailey Ave. high-rise. “I used to help my girlfriends back in the day.”

As for the food, Ms. Mercado recounted how her reputation for making tasty dishes grew to the point that other residents asked for her help.

“Whenever there was a party, everyone would come to me so I could do the rice, the potato salad, the roast pork — the pernil,” she said. “Everybody loved my pernil.”

Ms. Mercado’s combination of administrative savvy and a nurturing personality seems likely to serve her well as her three-year term gets underway. The head of a tenants’ association at a public housing project often acts as a mix of grassroots activist, lobbying NYCHA officials and politicians for improvements; social worker, helping residents work out issues among one other; and community organizer, planning events like an annual outdoor party for past and present tenants.

One of the most important assets possessed by Ms. Mercado, who was born in Santurce, Puerto Rico, is her language ability.

“A lot of the tenants were saying they can’t come to the tenants meetings,” she said. “I can translate for them.”

Ms. Mercado, a mother of three, added while NYCHA provides translation services in some settings, native Spanish speakers “feel more secure now. Maybe things will be working out better.”

Asked what she would like to change at the Ft. Independence Houses, most of her concerns boiled down to security.

Ms. Mercado said she would like the police to conduct frequent foot patrols. She explained that since the authorities reduced the NYPD presence at the Ft. Independence Houses years ago, more non-residents walk through the building as a shortcut to get from Fort Independence Street to Bailey Avenue.

She also remains unnerved by a June 2013 incident in which a bullet grazed the arm of a then-9-year-old girl walking home to the Ft. Independence Houses on a Friday night.

“It’s the time of [year] I really don’t like,” she said of the summer. “Ever since this happened to that little girl downstairs, I’m like, why?”

During Ms. Luray’s six total years as president of the tenants’ association, she maintained regular contact with the neighborhood’s elected officials. An introduction to local politics awaits Ms. Mercado in the form of an ongoing battle over the Ft. Independence Houses’ stoves and other essentials. Residents are furious that NYCHA is yet to spend nearly $1 million that Councilman Fernando Cabrera allocated last year for a new stove and refrigerator in every unit, along with improvements to the project’s playground.

“The main thing right now is the stoves,” Ms. Mercado said.

She was modest about her election as tenants’ association president earlier this year. But Ms. Luray called the change a historic one.

“We have our first African-American president, Obama. Now we have our first Latina president, Mercado,” she said. “So, we’re good.”