It’s not just Soho — the West Village is also looking like a throwback to the 1970s and ’80s with spray paint covering storefronts and mounds of stinking garbage cluttering sidewalks.
Fed-up locals in the once-desirable neighborhood told The Post on Thursday they have no choice but to deal with the unsightly conditions.
“It’s insane,” Katrina Kulyzhka said as she walked along Sixth Avenue Thursday — a day after The Post revealed how Soho has also been overrun with graffiti vandals.
“New York City is taking garbage to a whole new level.”
“What’s shocking is it doesn’t even surprise you anymore,” the 28-year-old Tribeca resident added. “You’re just like, ‘Eh, I’ll walk around it.’”
A stroll around the neighborhood turned up loads of graffiti — including across three adjoining buildings on Sixth Avenue near West 3rd Street — and piles of busted furniture and garbage strewn on the sidewalks.
“These are terrible conditions,” said Earfanul Haque, whose newsstand near West 3rd Street sits next to a pile of garbage. “My observation is the Sanitation Department — those people are not really functioning. Supervision is very poor.”
Meanwhile, merchants in the area also complained of homeless people routinely menacing them — and even getting violent at times.
Workers at the Fantasy Parties sex shop near West 4th Street said one vagrant tossed a brick through their front window less than two weeks ago.
“He’s usually walking around mumbling under his breath,” said an employee who did not want to be identified.
“It’s definitely a problem,” she said. “Nobody is doing enough. We have to go out and sweep every 15 minutes or we would get fined.”
Medlat Ghaly, a manger at Papaya Dog, recalled a knife-wielding vagrant confronting one of his employees inside.
“He pushed all the stuff off over the counter,” said Ghaly. “He wanted some free stuff.”
Ghaly said the same disturbed homeless man flashed a knife during another incident.
“I’m angry,” he said. “I can’t do nothing about it or they will arrest me.”
Police were called to the Papaya Dog and Fantasy Parties incidents and arrested two men — Terrance Shannon, 36, charged with criminal mischief inside the eatery on May 23 and Jasper Hillard, 30, who was nabbed on the same charges and possession of a controlled substance for chucking “an object” through the sex shop window.
A scourge of graffiti has overtaken Soho, leaving locals fearful that the trendy neighborhood was turning into a “junkier” down-market disaster.
Vandals have targeted Black Wall Street Gallery for three consecutive nights this week, splashing white paint on the windows and writing “ETC REAL ART” on the front door.
The Mercer Street gallery is featuring an exhibit on the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre. The incidents are being probed as hate crimes by the NYPD.
“Continued vandalism is a sign of willful ignorance,” gallery owner Ricco Wright said on Thursday. “Anywhere there’s a hate crime there should be more of a police presence. I support graffiti as an element of hip hop, but don’t support vandalism.”
At his daily press briefing, Mayor de Blasio vowed his Cleanup Corps team would be out in full force this summer to scrub away the graffiti across the five boroughs.
“You’re going to see a particularly strong impact going into July, August, as we get ready for everything coming back off the summer,” he said. “We’re going to address the graffiti issue across the board and it’s one of many things were going to bring this city back.”
Additional reporting by Elizabeth Rosner
