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August 18, 2006
Positive Imprint
Village Voice, Letters
ACORN Executive Director Bertha Lewis counters the portrayal of Atlantic Yards footprint residents who face displacement by claiming that the project promises 50% afforable housing.
Cynthia Carr's piece on the Atlantic Yards Development ["Life in the Footprint," August 2–8] completely ignored the larger context. This development is about finding solutions to New York's affordable-housing crisis. In 2005, Brooklyn's vacancy rate was 2.8 percent, and this city's population is expected to jump 16 percent over the next 25 years. Real median incomes fell 6.3 percent between 2002 and 2005, while rents jumped 8 percent. We need to build more housing and it must be affordable. ACORN has worked with Forest City Ratner to guarantee that 50 percent of the 4,500 new units planned for Atlantic Yards will be rent stabilized and affordable to low, moderate, and middle-income families. We need to get serious about building more housing and Atlantic Yards is a step in the right direction.
Bertha Lewis
Executive director, NY ACORN Brooklyn
NoLandGrab: Once again, Bertha Lewis ignores the inconvenient fact that after the 50/50 "affordable housing" plan was announced, Bruce Ratner announced an addition of thousands (currently 2360) of luxury condos to the plan. Now the percentage of "affordable housing" stands around 33%.
Also, Norman Oder at Atlantic Yards Report has noted, "some two-thirds of ACORN followers surveyed on the Atlantic Yards project have household income under $30,000; they'd be eligible for some 900 of the subsidized apartments.
Bertha continues to stand by her deal, but can she stand by the numbers?
Posted by lumi at August 18, 2006 7:15 AM