Inwood Street Co-Named For Late Carrot Top Pastries Owner

INWOOD, NY — The stretch of Broadway home to Inwood's Carrot Top Pastries now bears the name of the bakery's late owner.

Community leaders, politicians and family members gathered on the corner of West 214th Street and Broadway to unveil a street sign that reads "Renee Mancino Way." Mancino ran Carrot Top Pastries, a popular business for baked goods and coffee, with her husband Bob Mancino.

In August 2016 the City Council approved the street co-naming after a previous failed attempt. More than 650 people signed a petition on Change.org in support of the the co-naming and hundreds sent letters to the City Council in support of the co-naming.

"For over 35 years, Renee generously donated to senior centers, little leagues, neighborhood organizations, cultural institutions, historic houses, colleges, universities, local police, fire and sanitation departments," reads the petition.

The bill to co-name West 214th Street and Broadway was co-sponsored by City Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez and several other city council members.

"I’m so proud to honor Rene Mancino, a treasure whose legacy lives on through her neighborhood institutions," Rodriguez said when the co-naming passed. "Carrot Top has long been the go-to place for baked goods uptown and Ms. Mancino’s baking warmed the hearts of all who stopped in."

Mancino owned the Carrot Top Pastries until 2014, when she committed suicide amid health problems and concerns that her landlord would hike up the the rent at Carrot Top Pastries.

“Thirty years don’t mean nothing. We paid rent 31 years and you have to open up negotiations? We broke our backs for 31 years. We built this business,” her husband Bob Mancino told the New York Post in 2014. “My wife killed herself right in front of me because she couldn’t take it any longer.”

Photo courtesy City Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez