Bench dedicated to Aggie Brose unveiled in Garfield
Ideas for how to better neighborhoods grow when community members get together. Perhaps a few will sprout when neighbors meet on a new bench in Garfield dedicated to the memory of longtime community leader Aggie Brose.
The bench, and a spray park feature Ms. Brose advocated for, were unveiled Friday at Nelson Mandela Peace Park on the corner of North Evaline and Broad streets.
“A bench itself brings people together . ... My grandmother was somebody who could bring everyone together, the community [and] elected officials, and build consensus around really tough projects,” said Lauren Byrne Connelly, executive director of the Lawrenceville Corporation, a nonprofit community group.
Ms. Brose, who died at age 84 in July 2019, was a founding member of the Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation and continued the nonprofit’s community development mission for more than four decades.
As a girl, she lived right around the corner from where her memorial bench now sits, and she raised her own family a couple of blocks away on Dearborn Street.
Water misted from the new feature after several generations of Ms. Brose’s family gathered alongside state Sen. Wayne Fontana, D-Brookline; Rep. Ed Gainey, D-Lincoln-Lemington; Mayor Bill Peduto; and City Council member Ricky Burgess for the ribbon-cutting ceremony.
“Aggie is the ‘why’ this happened,” Mr. Fontana said. “The idea of a spray park was first brought to my attention by Aggie a few years ago while
attending an event right here that she invited me to. ... Anyone who knew Aggie knew she was very determined and a passionate person, so understandably, she made a great case for why a splash component was so important to this parklet and to this community. Sadly, Aggie passed last year before she got to see it, but I for one wasn’t going to let her down.”
Mr. Fontana said he and fellow Democrats secured a $100,000 state grant to fund the upgrade to the parklet designed by Andrea Ketzel, a landscape architect for the city.
“When you talk about the definition of a community leader, it don’t get no better than Aggie Brose,” said Mr. Gainey. “... Garfield would not be Garfield without Aggie Brose. There’s no way.”
But Ms. Brose’s advocacy reached beyond Pittsburgh. She became nationally known in the community-development world, fighting banks on redlining and discriminatory lending practices, among other systemic issues that plagued low-income communities.
“Before there were the discussions we’re having now about affordable housing, Aggie was down in Washington fighting,” said Mr. Peduto, adding that he began working with Ms. Brose in the 1990s.
“Anybody who lived in Garfield in 1995 would tell you it was a much different neighborhood,” he said. “The problems and the issues that this neighborhood were facing were issues of safety, issues of blight and vacant properties. They were issues of crime that was some of the worst within the city, but the neighborhood pulled together. The people who lived here said, ‘We’re not giving up. We’re going to stay and we’re going to put together a plan.’ And the Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation became the vehicle that saw that community plan enforced.”
Mr. Burgess, who represents Garfield, said Ms. Brose was “steadfast” and added that “by showing this amenity at this COVID time, I think we’re showing how important parks are to communities.”