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August 23, 2006
Raucous Meeting on Atlantic Yards Plan Hints at Hardening Stances
The NY Times
By Andy Newman
An overflow crowd vehemently laid out the pros and cons of the proposed Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn for seven hours last night at a raucous public meeting. Their passions suggested that opinions had only hardened in the three years since development plans were announced.
“This project essentially separates the neighborhoods of Brooklyn rather than uniting them,” said Jonathan Barkey, a photographer, brandishing posters he had generated of proposed skyscrapers towering over existing brownstones and playgrounds. “I would call this development a Great Wall of Brooklyn.”
Bring it on, said Dan Jederlinic, an ironworker. “Bulldozers are coming,” he warned the project’s opponents to whooping applause, “and if you don’t get out of the way they’re going to bulldoze right over you!”
...
The Rev. Herbert Daughtry, a civil rights activist whose church nearly abuts the project site, was talking to reporters about the need for lower-income housing when Mr. Barkey, the photographer, interrupted him.“Like this?” Mr. Barkey said sarcastically, pointing to his posters of huge, blank building faces towering over a neighborhood. “This is rich folks’ housing. Look at these walls.”
Mr. Daughtry was not impressed. “Don’t you understand that all we’ve been around is walls all our lives?” he said. “You need to take that somewhere else.”
NoLandGrab: During his testimony, Rev. Daughtry addressed criticisms that he lived in New Jersey, by explaining that he has a place in Brooklyn, a home in Jersey and even a house in Georgia.
He probably didn't mean to rub the fact that he has three homes in everyone's faces, especially those of the affordable-housing advocates.
Posted by lumi at August 23, 2006 11:55 PM