I shifted no blame -- in fact, I very explicitly said that the author's various blamings of the various outside forces are all probably true.

"Enough for me" is not the question. I pass no judgement on what the residents of ENY are or are not doing.

I was rather commenting about the article, not the residents. The article purports to be a piece about the decay of ENY, yet did not mention anything about what people who actually live there are doing about their own situation.

I am fairly certain such people exist, yet the author neglected to interview any of them, in favor of a pure "passive victimization by outside forces" narrative.

You can find thousands of people making a positive difference. The reason people live there in the first place is they don't have significant power. Volunteering at a food bank is not going to change the situation.

In the end community action is often pointless at a larger scale.

PS: Not to be overly negative but guess where the poor area is on this map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Subway_map#/medi...

This sounds like precisely the sort of investigation the author should have included in the article.