The work to save Harlem is urgent, as historic townhouse-lined blocks, Gothic-designed, faith-based institutions, and buildings that were sites for significant African American cultural and political accomplishments of the 19th and 20th centuries are being picked off, one by one, by real estate developers. Harlem is not protected from aggressive developers, who are quickly changing the face of Harlem’s landscape. Today, less than 20% of the buildings in Harlem are designated, while designation has been awarded to 66% of the buildings in Greenwich Village, and 50% of the buildings on the Upper East and West Sides.

Immediately upon organizing in 2015, SHN! began lobbying the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) for more designations in Harlem. SHN! supported the extension of the Mount Morris Park Historic District, and successfully lobbied for landmark status for six properties, including the Harlem YMCA, which had languished on the LPC calendar for decades.

One of SHN!’s noteworthy accomplishments was spearheading the effort to designate the Central Harlem West 130th - 132nd Streets Historic District in 2018. In 2021, SHN! supported the efforts of the West Harlem Community Preservation Organization and the Dorrance Brooks Square Property Owners and Residents Association to secure designation of the Dorrance Brooks Square Historic District, the first New York City historic district named in honor of an African American. Also in 2021, the Harlem Branch Library, frequented by the well-known and respected writers Langston Hughes and James Baldwin, was designated as an individual landmark. In 2023, the iconic Hotel Cecil and Minton’s Playhouse, where bebop was developed and refined, received a long overdue individual landmark designation.

In 2022, SHN! hired an Executive Director, to provide administrative, management, and organizational support to further the organization’s mission. This hire was made possible by a generous grant from the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation that was created to support the longevity of historic African American sites. Also in 2022, SHN! received a generous grant from the Ford Foundation to support its infrastructure. In 2023, NYC Councilmember Kristin Richardson Jordan and NYS Senator Cordell Cleare provided funding to support the programming of educational workshops targeted to low-income and elderly homeowners of historic properties.

SHN!’s work has been recognized in the preservation community with the Preservation League of New York State’s Pillar of New York Award, given to our President, Valerie Jo Bradley, in 2023; the Guides Association of New York City’s Apple Award for Outstanding Achievement in Support of New York City Preservation in 2023; the New York Landmarks Conservancy’s Lucy G. Moses Award in 2020; and the New York City Historic Districts Council’s Grassroots Preservation Award in 2019.

Although SHN! is encouraged by its successes, we are going forward with intensified efforts to obtain more landmark designations in Harlem.