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Community Profile - Jimmy Pelsey
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 Since 1996, Jimmy Pelsey has been President of the Tenants Association at the Robert Fulton Houses, a large public NYCHA housing development in West Chelsea. Jimmy has lived in Chelsea for nearly 30 years. He has played a key role in fostering a dialogue between Fulton Houses' tenants and other residents, businesses, and organizations in the area.
FHL: How did you become President of the Fulton Houses Tenants Association?
JP: I used to work for a yarn company. I was a color specialist for 38 years, and I retired in 1996. At that particular time, we did not have a Tenants Association here. The manager, Ms. Terry Dawson, along with a few neighbors around here, plotted up to get me to be the president, which I did not particularly want to get into. The job itself takes up a heck of a lot of free time that I otherwise would be spending with my grandkids. The office is set up so our door is open approximately 11 to 12 hours a day, so out tenants can just drop in. My job is to try and see that the tenants are heard by the administration and the neighborhood. There's a tremendous amount of commercial development around here, with the bars and the hotels and so on. I represent the tenants to these businesses, and it's my job to make sure that our tenants are respected in the neighborhood.
FHL: Do you think there is a strong sense of community in this neighborhood?
JP: Yes, I do. My time here goes back to 1976. I remember when this whole Chelsea neighborhood was what we referred to as "the boondocks." It was just so out of the way of the buildup of Manhattan. We're what used to be called a project. It's not a project now, it's a housing development, and it's sitting right smack in the middle of hundreds of millions of dollars of construction. There's a lot of extra money around now, and if there's no communication between the businesses and the residents, both will fail. So the community itself has had to pull together to come up with solutions for the problems we have.
FHL: You organize a lot of events here at Fulton Houses. What are some of your favorites?
JP: One favorite one was a very sad one. After 9/11 we wanted to reach out and help somehow. So we cooked dinner and lunch for one week after the disaster for all of the EMTs who were out on 17th Street and 10th Avenue. We also cook on Thanksgiving. I am in touch with many of the businesses around here, and each year they contribute turkeys for the people who live in the development. There's another one called Fulton Family Day. We set it up so we block off the street, and I have a great, big 50-gallon drum barbecue rack. We get funds from the City, and it's a day that all the kids and families come out. That's my favorite too.
FHL: What do you like to do around the neighborhood when you don't have to be in the office?
JP: My big relaxation is to be with my grandkids. We have a lot of fun. They love to walk and run, so we walk down to Battery City, along the Hudson River Park. We go out to eat, I like to take them places because they're so appreciative. I like to take care of them. My free time is rare, I'm always seeing someone, or going to talk to somebody about something. I try to be as active as possible because of the age factor. I'm seventy years old, and I'd really like to continue helping out in the neighborhood.
FHL: What do you think the redevelopment of the High Line will mean for your neighborhood?
JP: The High Line is going to mean a lot of future things for our young people. A lot of elderly tenants and residents feel at last we are not being ignored, and finally something is being preserved for us. We are not doing away with our past, but instead bringing our past to the present. I think most of the residents are ecstatic about the High Line, that we can have something like a park where we can walk and take our kids and the elderly. The tenants tend to ask, "What is this going to do for me in the long run?" They want to know about the future for their children and their children's children. The best thing is, it's been presented to the community in a fashion and a manner so that they would understand it. You can do something, but when you communicate with the people in the neighborhood about the future, it works. I was so pleased at first, and I had no idea it would go this far. It's magnificent.
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