We’re supporting two substantial initiatives to bring Brooklynites together, through affordable housing and block beautification.

For the third installment of our month of spreading #BrooklynLove (yes we even created a Twitter hashtag), we are highlighting the local organizations dedicated to the health and wellness of our neighbors and our neighborhoods.

This week we’re hearing a lot about heroes returning home to Brooklyn—Barbra Streisand will perform her first-ever concert in the borough a week before Jimmy Kimmel hosts a week of late night talk at BAM Harvey in October. But some of our heroes never left Brooklyn, dedicating their personal and professional lives to doing good right here. Like Greg Jackson.

As protestors and historians alike marked International Workers Day on May 1, here in Brooklyn the gap continues to grow between our residents who are finding entrepreneurial opportunity and new industries in our neighborhoods, and those who, without reliable employment and the resources to invest in new skills and education, continue to sink deeper and deeper into poverty.

We’re proud to say that Brooklyn is New York City’s community gardening capital—over 50% of the City’s gardeners plant their seeds here, and there are 46 gardens in Bed-Stuy alone. Yet of the five boroughs, Brooklyn has the second least amount of parkland per person, so it’s no wonder that resourceful Brooklynites have taken on greening public spaces themselves to provide more places to grow, learn, and enjoy in our neighborhoods.

This week, after months of research and review by our partners at the Center for the Study of Brooklyn at Brooklyn College, we published the first-ever "Brooklyn Neighborhood Reports."