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History: With a population of about 7000, St. George lies on the hills of the northeastern shore of Staten Island. It is bounded on the north and east by Upper New York Bay, on the south by Tompkinsville, and New Brighton on the west. The British fortified Fort Hill during the American Revolution. In 1799, the federal government opened a quarantine station on Bay Street. After remaining rural until the 1830s, the area became fashionable when several elegant hotels were built on St. Marks Place across what was later to become the site of Curtis High School. In 1868 the land occupied by the quarantine station was taken over by the U.S. Lighthouse Service. The neighborhood was considered part of New Brighton until the 1880s, when Erastus Wiman consolidated local ferry lines and rail routes. Wiman reportedly renamed the area for George Law, an investor in railroads and ferries whose land he needed for the ferry terminal. [1]

St. George grew rapidly in the early 20^th century. Several public institutions were built, such as Curtis High School and a branch of the New York library. Municipal ferry service to Manhattan began in 1905. In 1964, the construction of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and the Staten Island Expressway on the west led to the development of the interior and the gradual decline of the neighborhood. Commercial property remained vacant and important institutions moved out. The most densely developed neighborhood in Staten Island, St. George faces many problems, including homelessness. Nonetheless, it remains the center of government and transportation for the borough. [1]

A minor-league baseball stadium for the New York Yankees and a waterfront esplanade were completed in the spring of 2001. There are also plans for a national Lighthouse Museum, a new Staten Island Institution for the Arts and Sciences building and a refurbished ferry terminal. Fort Hill is residential, with housing consisting of apartment buildings and older one and two-family houses. The population is economically and racially diverse; many residents are young professionals who work in Manhattan. [1 p1034]

Stapleton – Located in northeastern Staten Island, Stapleton is bounded by Grant Street to the north, Upper New York Bay to the east, Vanderbilt Avenue to the south and St. Paul’s Avenue and Van Duzer Street to the west. The area was the commercial center of Southfield Township (which became part of the incorporated village of Edgewater in 1866). William J. Staples, a merchant and entrepreneur after whom the neighborhood was named, along with Minthorne Tompkins (son of Vice President Daniel D. Tompkins) acquired land from the Vanderbilts to create a new village. Upon completion, they established ferry service to Manhattan and advertised their newly created village from 1836. By 1884 Staten Island Rapid Transit extended its tracks along the waterfront from the foot of Vanderbilt Avenue to Tompkinsville Landing and to ferry facilities in St. George; direct passenger ferry service from Stapleton to Manhattan was discontinued in 1886. Municipal piers built by New York City in the 1920s were never fully exploited although several were used as the first foreign trade zone in the United States. In the 1980s Stapleton attracted a few immigrants from India, Liberia, China, Jamaica, and Trinidad & Tobago and to a lesser extent, the Philippines, Guyana, Korea and Nigeria. The neighborhood in the mid-1990s was a residential and commercial center inhabited by urban professionals and blue-collar workers, including blacks, Italians, Armenians and Latin Americans. [1 p1111]

UHF Neighborhood: AIDS data is reported by zip code and the NYC Department of Health (DOH) reports AIDS statistics using the United Hospital Fund (UHF) zip code clusters. For UHF Stapleton/St. George, the cluster includes zip codes 10301, 10304 and 10305. Of all Staten Island neighborhoods, the impact of the AIDS epidemic has been most acute in

Source: The NYC Dept. of Health

Stapleton/St. George. With 26% of the population, this neighborhood has 46% of individuals diagnosed with HIV/AIDS. The vast majority, 55%, of people with AIDS (PWAs)¹ in Stapleton/St. George acquired the virus through intravenous drug use (IDU). Twenty-four percent of diagnosed AIDS cases in this UHF neighborhood were attributed to men having sex with men (MSM), 13% to heterosexual or probable heterosexual transmission, and 8% to other/unknown factors. [2] By the end of December 2001, Stapleton/St. George had 1,172 PWAs and a cumulative AIDS case rate of 1,237 per 100,000 – 1^st in Staten Island and 22^nd in NYC. Approximately 67% of these individuals diagnosed with AIDS have already died. [2] UHF Stapleton/St. George has more residents diagnosed with AIDS than fourteen states, including West Virginia. At 415, UHF Stapleton/St. George has more PLWAs than 7 states. [2 & 3]

Source: The NYC Dept. of Health

Seroprevalence Data presented on HIV are preliminary and are an underestimate of the total number of persons living with HIV in NYC. Mandatory reporting of HIV diagnoses and selected laboratory tests (Western Blot, detectable HIV viral load, and CD4<500 cells) began in June 2000. However, HIV surveillance data are incomplete because diagnosed ² people living with HIV (PLWH) are not all reportable under the existing law; undiagnosed³ PLWH are not

Source: The NYC Dept. of Health

reportable, and laboratory and provider reporting may be incomplete. [2] The NYC Department of Health reports that there were 180 PLWH in St. George/Stapleton by August 2002. Further relying on the estimate of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that only 2/3 of HIV seropositive persons are aware of their HIV status, St. George/Stapleton has about 240 seropositive individuals. [2]

The Community Needs Index (CNI) was developed by the New York State Department of Health AIDS Institute "to assist HIV prevention programs in identifying communities – at the zip code level – that are at increased need for intervention." In the 2000 CNI, two of the six zip codes in CD 1 ranked "moderate need". Zip code 10304, at the 77.4 percentile ranked 1^st of 12 in Staten Island and 40^th of the 177 zip codes for NYC; 10301 at the 65.5 percentile, ranked 2^nd in Staten Island and 61^st in NYC; 10310 at the 51.4 percentile ranked 3^rd in Staten Island and 86^th in NYC; 10303 at the 50.8 percentile ranked 4^th in Staten Island and 87^th in NYC; 10302 at the 41.2 percentile ranked 5^th in Staten Island and 104^th in NYC and 10305 at the 28.8 percentile, ranked 6^th in Staten Island and 126^th in NYC. [6]

The three UHF zip codes of St. George/Stapleton: 10301, 10304 and 10305 have high rates of AIDS frequency. Zip codes 10304 and 10301, at 353 and 170 per 100,000, rank first and second respectively in Staten Island in total adults AIDS cases. In addition to high AIDS frequency rate, zip code 10301, with 11.1/100 live births, ranks highest in the rate of low birth weight in Staten Island. Other high-risk indicators in this neighborhood include: cocaine discharge rate, highest in zip code 10304 at 3,499/100,000 and the highest rate of male HIV discharges at 2,889/100,000 in 10304. [6]

Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs) From 1996 to 2001, the NYC DOH compiled a summary of the incidence of STDs in NYC’s UHF neighborhoods. The summary included case rates of gonorrhea, chlamydia (females only) and primary and secondary syphilis (P&S Syphilis) in these neighborhoods. By the end of 2001, the rates of all STDs had increased in NYC from the 2000 rates: P&S Syphilis by 133%, chlamydia by 11% and gonorrhea by 8%. [7]

Source: The NYC Dept. of Health

In 2001, UHF St. George/Stapleton saw an increase of 18% in the rate of gonorrhea and a 4% decrease in chlamydia from 2000, while the rate of P&S Syphilis remained stable at 0. The rates of gonorrhea and chlamydia, at 83 and 322 per 100,000 were second highest in SI after Port Richmond, and 27^th and 26^th of the 42 UHF NYC neighborhoods. [7]

Tuberculosis (TB) NYC’s 2000 tuberculosis rate, at 19.9/100,000, was over three times the national rate and over five times the national goal established for tuberculosis control by the year 2000, and was higher than that of any other reporting jurisdiction. [8]

With 32 cases, Staten Island had 2.4% of NYC’s reported cases in 2000. Of the 32 cases, 65.6% were foreign-born and the rest US-born. SI ranked 21^st of the 29 NYC HDs in the number of TB cases. [8]

Community District One (CD 1) Together, St. George, Stapleton and Port Richmond form Staten Island Community District 1 (CD1). The boundaries are Kill Van Kull to the north, the Staten Island Expressway to the south, Arthur Kill to the east and the Narrows (Upper New York Bay) to the west. According to the 2000 Census, CD1 is 50% white (9.6% decrease from the 1990 Census), 21.6% African-American (41.5% increase), 19.8% Hispanic (87.4% increase) and 5.3% Asian and Pacific Islander (63.2% increase). The percentage of people receiving income support was 15% compared to 8.5% for Staten Island. CD 1 has seen an increase in infant mortality between 1995 and 1999. The rate has risen from 4.3/1000 in 1995 to 5.5/1,000 in 1998 to 7.9/1,000 live births in 1999. [4] CD 1 also had a high rate (249) of teen births in 2000, accounting for 10% of all births in the CD. [9]

PLWA Estimate for Staten Island Community District (CD) 1: While AIDS is reported by zip code rather than by community district, Community Studies of New York, Inc, (CSNY) a research organization providing broad-based comparison of health data, has developed a method of estimating the number of PLWAs in each CD by calculating land use patterns. AIDS Trends: CSNY estimates that in 2000, 456 people were reported to be living with AIDS in Stapleton/St. George, CD 1. This is 60% of the Staten Island total and 1% of the NYC total. Forty-nine percent of these cases were attributable to injection drug use (IDU), 17% to men who have sex with men (MSM), 14% to heterosexual contact and 20% to other/unknown risk factors. Thirty-seven percent of the PLWAs in CD 1 are white, 42% are black, and 21% are Hispanic. [5]

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Consider this a tool to find more information - not just these publications, but also these types of publications. Note that we provide information on how to get these publications or updates on your own.

1. The Encyclopedia of New York City, edited by Kenneth T. Jackson, Yale University Press – New Haven & London / The New York Historical Society – New York, 1995.
   
2. HIV/AIDS New York City, Surveillance Update, including Persons Living with AIDS in New York City; Reported through 12/2001. (June 2002) NYC Office of AIDS Surveillance; NYC Department of Health, Box 44, 346 Broadway, Room 706; NYC, New York 10013 (212) 442-3388. http://www.ci.nyc.ny.us/
   
3. HIV/AIDS Surveillance Report, U.S. HIV and AIDS cases reported through December 2001, Mid-Year Edition Vol.12, No. 1. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services / Public Health Service / Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Atlanta Georgia 30333 (800) 458-5231 or (301) 217-0023. Website: http://www.cdc.gov
   
4. Community District Needs, Fiscal Year 2001 Staten Island, The City of New York Office of Management and Budget, Department of City Planning, 20 Reade Street, NYC, NY 10007.



5. Community Studies of New York, Inc., INFOSHARE) East 78^th Street, NYC, NY 10021 Phone: (718) 997-5142 Fax: (718) 997-5146.
   
6. Community Needs Index (CNI), New York State Department of Health, AIDS Institute (December 2000) Room 244 Corning Tower; Empire State Plaza; Albany, New York 12237-0658 (518) 486-6096.
   
7. 1996-2001 STD Surveillance Data by New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Department of Health, Box 44, 346 Broadway, Room 706; NYC, New York 10013 (212) 788-4462. {Contact Laura Naylans for more information}.
   
8. Tuberculosis in New York City 2000 Information Summary (2000) Bureau of Tuberculosis Control, NYC Department of Health; 125 Worth Street, NYC, NY 1007 (212) 553-4283.
   
9. Summary of Vital Statistics 2000, the City of New York. Office of Vital Statistics, New York City Department of Health, Box 7, New York, New York 10013.

Prepared by Marda Yilma, Community Resources Developer for the Brooklyn AIDS Task Force Community Resources Project . This publication was supported by grant number 5H89HA00015-12 from the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). This grant is funded through Title I of the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency Act of 1990, as amended by the Ryan WhiteCARE Act Amendments of 1996 and 2000, through the NYC Department of Mental Hygiene to the Medical and Health Research Association of NYC, Inc. It’s contents are solely the responsibility of theBrooklyn AIDS Task Force, Inc. and do not necessarily represent the views of the funders. Phone (718) 783-0883 X129 with questions or e-mail: myilma@batf.net. For information about BATF’s other programs, call 718-622-2910 or access: www.batf.net.