Matan Gavish said he’s giving Upper West Siders a “gift.”
Gavish, founder and chief instructor at Krav Maga Academy, a self-defense and fitness studio on West 27th Street, is just one of the New York City self-defense instructors who has seen a significant increase in the number of Upper West Siders seeking training. And most of the new mixed martial arts students are neighborhood moms.
Since August, Gavish has shared five self-defense videos for free with a private Facebook group with more than 15,000 members called Upper West Siders for Safer Streets. Gavish, who according to his website, has trained a special-ops unit in the Israeli Defense Forces, United States Navy Seals and Army Rangers, said someone invited him to join the group, and when he did, several members asked if he could make some free content. First-time classes otherwise would cost $20.
“When I saw the new reality the people on the Upper West Side are dealing with,” said Gavish, “I figured it is a great way to just give them something back and open their minds to the fact that they are not hopeless.”
This “new reality” began earlier this year, when the city moved homeless people out of crowded shelters and into 139 hotels across Manhattan to protect them from the coronavirus. Three of those hotels— the Lucerne, the Belleclaire and the Belnord— are hotels located on the Upper West Side.
According to the New York Police Department’s crime report, CompStat, in the past 28 days, there have been 18% more crime complaints on the Upper West Side, compared to the same 28-day period last year, even though this year’s crime rate is nearly 7% lower overall. Common complaints include robbery, burglary and misdemeanor assault.
When it comes to self-defense training, Gavish said many moms are asking about it. “They want to be able to protect themselves, so they’ll be able to protect their baby or their child,” he said.
Melissa Berry, who’s lived on the Upper West Side for eight years, has two daughters. She said she’s always wanted to sign up for a mother-daughter self-defense class with her oldest, and her neighborhood’s current state has sped up her process of looking for one.
Berry said she wants her 9-year-old daughter “to feel empowered and equipped” to get herself out of a dangerous situation safely.
The energy of Berry’s neighborhood is different now, she said. She feels like she’s on high alert, especially when she’s with her children. She said her mother, who was visiting a few weeks ago, saw someone smoking crack on a stoop two doors down from Berry’s home on West 86th Street near the Belnord Hotel.
“People have been doing drugs in New York City for ages, of course. But it wasn’t so obvious and blatant,” said Berry.
Elizabeth Bowen, a professor of social work at the University of Buffalo, said the fears people have toward those without housing are unfounded.
“Homeless people are really vulnerable, and we know from research that homeless people are a lot more likely to be victims of violence than they are perpetrators of violence,” she said.
Bowen said using hotels as shelters as an emergency response to the pandemic was needed, but should also be a wake-up call to how many people live on the streets.
“We need to do better with homelessness in this country,” said Bowen. “We need to do a better job of getting people into long-term permanent housing, so that next time we’re in a public health crisis, we’re not faced with this situation.”
At a press conference on September 8, Mayor de Blasio announced that homeless people would be relocated from the Upper West Side hotels by the end of the month. The mayor and the Department of Homeless Services did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
Besides Gavish, other martial arts instructors are stepping in to help Upper West Siders feel safe in their neighborhood. Darrell Phipps, founder of Valor Mixed Martial Arts, a gym on Broadway near West 71st Street, recommends people dabble in different types of MMA, using free trial classes as an option.
“If you want to be protected when someone’s grabbing you, do Krav Maga and kickboxing,” said Phipps. “If you want to learn how to fight on the ground, that’s where Jiu Jitsu comes in.”
Laura Rivera, a lifelong resident of the Upper West Side, said the current hotel situation makes her glad that she started her son in MMA when he was 5 years old, almost a decade ago. She said the neighborhood is regressing to how dangerous it was when she grew up in the 1980s and ‘90s, but she’s confident in her son’s ability to defend himself.
Rivera is a trained fighter and an instructor at Valor Mixed Martial Arts. Before the pandemic, Rivera was training all-girl groups, and she understands why more moms are exploring self-defense now, she said.
“Self-defense is not only about fighting, you can find a sense of empowerment,” Rivera said. “The biggest self-defense you can give is awareness.”