Staten Island is clover it.
The city is plowing ahead with the borough’s annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade — drawing complains from residents who say it’s “insensitive” to clear a major street like Forest Avenue for the event when so many local roads are still covered after last weekend’s snowstorm.
The city has zeroed in on clearing the West Brighton parade route, even plastering “no parking” signs four days out from the event — which is infuriating Staten Islanders who say they are starved for precious spaces because so little snow has been cleared so far.
“Staten Island is completely forgotten, which to me is just crazy,” said Jason Walters of Tompkinsville, who is one of the many asking the parade committee to push back the annual fete.
“I think the timing, considering that we are still digging ourselves out, is just a little insensitive.”
Other neighbors aired their grievances on social media — with many pledging not to move their cars from the parade route in spite of the NYPD rules.
“This is absolutely insulting,” one local said on Facebook.
Another called the move “tone-deaf,” stating: “Anyone thinking of coming to West Brighton in a car can just turn around now.”
Walters’ 82-year-old mother, who lives around the corner from the parade route, had been stuck inside her home since Monday because of what they say is subpar plowing conditions throughout her neighborhood.
Her street wasn’t plowed until Tuesday night, Walters said, and she has not been able to drive to pick up food or medicine because of the unsafe road conditions — and now wouldn’t be able to drive to Forest Avenue to get essential errands done, regardless.
The NYPD has shut down parking on the major thoroughfare to parking starting Thursday through the weekend, with warnings that violators will be towed starting on Saturday.
The city has directed its full attention to Forest Avenue because moving the annual parade to another week is simply not an option, according to the Staten Island St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee.
City resources, like DSNY and NYPD, as well as Irish bands participating in the event, are booked up every Saturday and Sunday for the remainder of the month for other St. Pat’s parties.
“We have conferred with the N.Y.P.D and they have informed us that a permit for ANY other date is extremely unlikely, if not outright impossible. We have thoroughly explored any modality other than cancellation and there are none that are feasible,” Edward T. Patterson, the committee chairman, said in a statement.
“The parade has NEVER been cancelled in its history. During Covid, although we were denied a permit, we marched up the sidewalk with our pipes and our banners. The lineage of the parade remains unbroken, and we have no intention of allowing that to change.”
Forest Avenue was mostly cleared of snow and ice on Monday evening — when the blizzard finally passed — and the Department of Sanitation will be continuously cleaning the roadway from curb to curb, the agency told The Post.
“We know this is a big annual celebration for Staten Islanders and, when the organizers said they would like to move forward with this, we made sure a plan was in place so that the parade could continue,” said spokesperson Vincent Gragnani.
DSNY dispatched an unprecedented number of personnel and trucks throughout Staten Island to tackle the nearly 30 inches that were recorded in the borough, and has been constantly relocating piles of snow to Midland Beach.
As of Tuesday afternoon, Mayor Mamdani said that 99.2% of roadways on the island had “received at least one pass from snow clearing equipment” — but residents say they’re still blanketed under a slushy and fluffy mess.
“The ‘no parking’ thing is problematic on the residential streets. With this volume of snow and not 100% clearing, it definitely creates challenges for people who are disabled or have to have their car nearby because of medical reasons, and so making people move their vehicles to potentially, you know, an area that’s 4 or 5 blocks away is an onerous ask for people,” said Kristin Daggan, who’s shop Clay & Kiln lies along the parade route.
The snow-clearing map — which shows how frequently the DSNY clears the streets — is not up-to-date enough for residents to properly travel to school or work this week, let alone a holiday parade.
“We’re such a car borough. Staten Island is different, and that’s not a bad thing. We don’t have the trains. We don’t have the same volume of bus service and other things that the other boroughs have. So it just adds an extra layer of strain when the roads are not passable,” Daggan said.