The Eminent Domain

As part of FUREE, Families United for Racial and Economic Equality, I’ve been deep in the struggle for downtown Brooklyn’s residents and businesses while the area is turning into a construction site for luxury condos. But lately I’ve been telling people here that if they think that gentrification and development are isolated issues solely affecting Downtown Brooklyn, they’ll need to look a little deeper into the East, towards Jamaica, Queens, for a bitter dose of the reality of NYC’s new deja vu. I’m watching the area my family lives in turn into the next neighborhood under siege.

As shops close, people are displaced, schools are threatened and politicians smile in the community’s face, Brooklyn has been resilient in fighting back as best it can, knowing that it is wrong; knowing that it is actually hurting the community. On the flipside, however, in Jamaica, Queens, some folks don’t realize that what initially happened in Downtown Brooklyn has and is happening there.

One morning, in its usual nonchalant tone, NY1 announced that the MTA handed over real estate in Jamaica, Queens to “spur” development. According to NY1, some people are welcoming the development, thinking that the city will keeps its promise that the development will cater to BOTH the Long Island Railroad commuters and Jamaica residents. Little do they know that Brooklyn probably thought the same thing in the very beginning in terms of “developing” the community.

While Jamaica fights gentrification and development in its already prospering community, Sunnyside, Queens, is fighting mass evictions and rent hikes, as real estate trusts buy up apartment buildings. And while Sunnyside is protesting, Far Rockaway is being “saved” by overdevelopment. The difference in these issues is who lives in the area and where their tax brackets lie. Like Downtown Brooklyn, Jamaica and Sunnyside had low-income, people of color and struggling working class folks in common, while the “overdeveloped” part of Far Rockaway shares more in common with the new gentrifiers, not so much in what they make or do for a living, but in developers’ attitude towards the rest of us just trying to live.
PlanNYC shows the city’s startling plan for Jamaica. Much like the plan for Downtown Brooklyn with its condos and new residents, it leaves little room for the people who are already there to have a say in it even happening and to know what their fate may be in the midst of being an “airport village” for JFK. And for further viewing, NYC.gov shows the new and improved view of Jamaica.

Actually NY1 left something out: Community Board 12 reviewed the Jamaica plan, and they rejected it. But the community’s official opinion didn’t matter; the plan went forward anyway.
The question now is: What are residents going to do in Jamaica when we start looking like Downtown Brooklyn? Will they stand up and take action before it begins or welcome it, thinking that this kind of gentrification will be different from all the rest.

And here I thought this would NEVER happen in Jamaica, Queens. But the developers are running out of space in parts of Brooklyn they want to touch, they are already all over Manhattan and the Bronx and Staten Island is just to far away for anyone to want to travel, for now.

Hopefully their words will turn into actions so that all of Queens doesn’t turn into this
and become just another form of déjà vu.

Just when you thought it was over…

Less than two weeks after City Council member Inez Dickens negotiated an agreement granting her approval of the controversial 125th Street rezoning plan in exchange for more affordable housing and decreased building heights, VOTE People plans to file a lawsuit tomorrow to stop City Council from voting on the plan Wednesday.

VOTE People, which you may remember as the group that tried earlier this month to halt the rezoning process using an obscure section of the City Charter, is now contending that the City has not given area residents ample notification as required by law. More details when the full text of the suit becomes available tomorrow.

According to Director Craig Schley, VOTE People was unsuccessful in collecting the necessary signatures from 20% of property owners in the area to be rezoned. He says the group hit a roadblock when trying to determine exactly which properties were considered part of the rezoning area, and precisely how many signatures would be needed to force an approval by a three-fourths majority of the Council.

But this latest tactic, he said in a phone conversation, is part and parcel of the group’s earlier action.

“It’s all about notice, due process, and transparency,” said Schley.

VOTE People’s attempts to stop the Harlem rezoning plan from passing are especially contentious because the city has made a conspicuous effort to involve “the community” throughout the process; beginning in 2005, Community Boards, local business owners, elected officials, civic groups, and BID members were invited to participate in advisory workshops on the future of Harlem. Notes from one of these workshops, with a list of Advisory Committee members attached, are available here.

This is not to say that VOTE People are the only ones unhappy with the way the proposal turned out; Community Board 10 voted to give its Conditional Disapproval to the plan, saying that the Environmental Impact Statement underestimated the adverse effects of the rezoning on the area. The Board’s Resolution called for “Real Community Benefits,” including income-targeted housing, incentives to support local businesses, an arts bonus, environmental protections, a prohibition on the use of eminent domain, and a number of amendments to the zoning text.

That was in December. Community Boards 9 and 11, also affected by the proposed rezoning, both gave Conditional Approval, citing a number of problems with the plan as it stood. Borough President Scott Stringer joined CB10 in rejecting the plan. None of it made much difference, though; the City Planning Commission ignored all three boards’ input and approved the rezoning in March, to much public outcry. So did the City Council’s Zoning and Franchises Subcommittee. Then, two weeks ago, before the plan could go before the full Council, Inez Dickens forged a compromise promising her approval if the plan were amended to include more affordable housing and more stringent building height limits. The two other Council members representing the area — Robert Jackson and Melissa Mark-Viverito — signed on as well. Now, VOTE People hopes to prevent the City Council from hearing the proposal this Wednesday, as is currently scheduled.

So where did it all go wrong? Schley maintains that the “appointed boards to the community,” as he calls Community Boards, are not representative of the people, because members are appointed by the Borough President. But that explanation isn’t satisfying. The Boards didn’t approve of this rezoning, and neither did Stringer. No one was playing along to try to ensure reappointment. The bigger question here is why, following what by all appearances was a rigorous process of community input, are local City Council members standing with the Bloomberg administration and not with their own constitutents?

After months of waiting for the city Economic Development Corporation to select a developer for the massive Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx neighborhood of the same name, the push is on, hard, to make the project work for Bronx residents.

EDC has selected the Related Companies to turn the historic 575,000-square-foot building in Kingsbridge Heights into a mixed-use development encompassing retail stores, entertainment venues, and recreation and community facilities. The Related Companies isn’t just any developer: its $12 billion national portfolio of real estate that includes Manhattan’s Time Warner Center. The Armory is the latest in a series of City-sponsored development projects awarded to Related; others include the Bronx Terminal Market and Brooklyn’s Gateway Mall.

In an impressive show of force, yesterday dozens of members of the Kingbridge Armory Redevelopment Alliance, or KARA, stood in front of City Hall to call for negotiations for a community benefits agreement for the armory project — one that will include living wage jobs, space for schools, and other badly needed resources for the neighborhood. KARA is also calling for a labor peace agreement and a project labor agreement to make sure that jobs, in construction, retail, janitorial services, and more are union positions. And its members want to see amenities the area simply doesn’t have, from a bookstore to a movie theater.

KARA is being organized by the Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition, a venerable force that helped the area withstand the devastation of abandonment in the 1970s. It’s now making sure that as the tide turns the other way and new profit-seeking ventures arrive in the neighborhood, that the new development strengthens the neighborhood, which remains predominantly low-income, instead of pushing it aside.

Behind the scenes, the alliance has already made an important stride: Wth local elected officials it persuaded EDC to set up a task force of residents, businesses and local leaders to set standards for the armory’s redevelopment. EDC proceeded to give preference in its selection process to developers who would agree to pay living wages, create community space, and support the neighborhood in other essential ways.

There was just one problem: neither of the viable proposals, from Related and from Atlantic Development Group, included any of those things. The preferences therefore meant nothing, and Related’s winning proposal looks like any other plan to develop a shopping and recreation center (its closest kin in the New York area is probably New Roc City, in downtown New Rochelle).

Now KARA is doing something extremely gutsy: It is trying to wrest the whole concept of a community benefits agreement back from the jaws of elected officials who have perverted it beyond recognition, so much so that New Yorkers who pay attention to development simply assume that a CBA is one step removed from a shakedown. (Check out the comments on blogs and news sites if you’d like to think that’s not true.) And you can’t exactly fault that perception, given “CBAs” like the Yankee Stadium deal that basically gives Bronx officials a pile of money they can spend in any way they want, plus an ample supply of free sports equipment.

The question now is: how is KARA going to change the script here? After all, EDC has already selected Related. Here on The Eminent Domain we’ll be following the story as KARA works to get Related to the bargaining table. KARA members will be providing updates on their campaign and vision for the neighborhood.

But the situation highlights a glaring reality: New York City is suffering from its lack of a citywide framework for how economic development projects like this happen. All over the city we’re seeing citizens wage campaigns to make development more responsive to its host communities — in West Harlem, Willets Point, downtown Brooklyn, Coney Island, and those are only the big ones — but they each fight their own lonely battles, often pitted against their own elected officials.

KARA has already assembled a strong roster and — this is key — a united front between residents, businesses, labor, and elected officials. Its members already include the Retail Workers, Teachers, Service Workers and Building Trades unions, and the alliance’s vision for the armory’s redevelopment has received endorsements from the Bronx Borough President Congressman Jose Serrano, the City Comptroller and Public Advocate, and seven members of the Bronx City Council delegation. But in the absence of a mechanism through which they can exercise influence on EDC’s development process, they will have a tough road to setting a better precedent for community benefits agreements.

City Says Kingsbridge Armory Will Become a Shopping Center (NY Times)

Redevelopment Plan Hurting Willets Point (NY Daily News)

Willets Point Project Faces City Council Stonewall (Queens Gazette)

Affordable Housing Programs in New York Get Record Boost (AM New York)

Results Are Mixed for Mayor’s PlaNYC Program (NY Sun)

Downtown Brooklyn Still Hot, But “Under-Retailed” (Brooklyn Daily Eagle)

Pols: Stop Bruce Now (Brooklyn Paper)

Macy’s Shopping for Harlem Site (The Real Deal)

O’Donnell Files FOIL Request (Columbia Spectator)

Manhattan Community Board 11 (Harlem and East Harlem) holds its general board meetings the third Tuesday of each month at 6:30 p.m.  Call 212.831.8929 or visit the website for location information.

Manhattan Community Board 10 (Harlem and Polo Grounds) holds its general board meetings the first Wednesday of each month at 6 p.m.  Call 212.749.3105 or visit the website for location information.

Brooklyn Community Board 2 (Brooklyn Heights, Fulton Mall, Boerum Hill, Fort Greene, Brooklyn Navy Yard, Fulton Ferry, and Clinton Hill) holds its general board meetings the second Wednesday of each month at 6 p.m.  Call 718.596.5410 for location information.

Manhattan Community Board 9 (Hamilton Heights, Manhattanville, and Morningside Heights) holds its general board meetings on the third Thursday of each month.  Call 212-864-6200 or visit the website for location information.

On Saturday May 10th the Municipal Art Society Planning Center will launch the second annual Livable Neighborhoods Program training at Hunter College. The Livable Neighborhoods Program, which first launched last May at Hunter College, was created to provide communities with the knowledge, tools, and training needed to transform local vision into effective plans. The program provides participants with in person training, a take home comprehensive community planning toolkit and access to a web-based network for ongoing to discussion.

Come join over one hundred New Yorkers from neighborhoods across the city in a discussion about the issues that matter to you and your neighborhood. Facilitators will include Tom Angotti of the Hunter College Center for Community Planning and Development, Anthony Borrelli of the Manhattan Borough President’s Office, Vicki Weiner of the Pratt Center for Community Development and many more.

Chances are, your neighborhood is rapidly growing and changing. The Livable Neighborhoods Program is designed to help you respond to that change and help your community grow in a more equitable and sustainable matter. For more information and to register online, please click here. If you would like to register by fax or mail, please click here to download the registration form. For more information contact Sideya Sherman at ssherman@mas.org or 212.935.3960 x 259.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:

Date and Time: Saturday May 10, 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.
Registration Deadline: Wednesday, May 7
Who Can Attend? Registration is open the public, however priority is given to members of grassroots organizations and community boards.
What Is The Cost? Participation in the program is free.
Where Is The Training? The training will take place at Hunter College with special assistance from Hunter College’s Center for Community Planning and Development (CCPD). Hunter College is located at 695 Park Ave (Manhattan). Corner of 68th Street and Lexington Ave.
Will Food Be Served? Yes. We will provide breakfast and lunch.
Can I Bring My Child? Yes. The LNP is designed to be as convenient for participants as possible. We will have a supervised children’s activity room available on both days of training for children school age and up.
How Do I Register? For more information and to register online, please click here. If you would like to register by fax or mail, please click here to download the registration form.

(via Community-Based Planning)

This is an opportunity for the community to preview and comment on NYU’s plans for expansion over the next 23 years.  As our friends at Community-Based Planning point out, this will affect New Yorkers in the Village as well as Downtown Brooklyn, Governor’s Island, and Gramercy.  See the website for more info.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008: 4:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Hemmerdinger Hall
Silver Center for Arts and Science
100 Washington Square East