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July 31, 2008
Who’ll Save New York? Paterson’s Possible Super-Friends
New York Magazine
by Alec Appelbaum
Bruce Ratner makes a cameo appearance in this Daily Intel piece on New York State's woeful fiscal woes (but he doesn't make the cut as a "super-friend").
Governor Paterson sat alone when he confessed the state's miserable financial condition yesterday, but he can't begin to fix the mess that way. Who really thinks the hog-tied State Legislature will solve the problem it created? The speech served as a Bat signal to stir powerful New Yorkers who can put the governor's urgent message into play. We've compiled a short list of possible super-friends.
...Douglas Durst is a model developer for public-private partnerships. While Bruce Ratner probably has his calendar full with bended-knee visits to potential lenders and tenants, and other powerful developers are terrified about paying back existing loans, the civic-minded Durst is doing well enough — he can lean on a solid base of busy buildings — to step up.
NoLandGrab: Since Bruce's public-private "partnerships" are usually one-way streets (guess which way the benefits flow), we're glad he's not a super-friend. He remains, however, super in another away.
Posted by eric at 9:52 AM
Double Dutch Gets Status in the Schools
The New York Times
by Winnie Hu
This story grabbed our attention with an eyebrow-raising sentence:
Mr. Goldstein is also negotiating with the developer Forest City Ratner to sponsor the double-dutch teams by providing $10,000 for uniforms, ropes and other equipment.
That would be Eric Goldstein, "who oversees the Public Schools Athletic League, the governing body for the city’s interscholastic sports." Not Daniel Goldstein, who has no interest in taking Forest City Ratner's filthy money.
NoLandGrab: We hope the PSAL is more successful in its "negotiation" with Forest City Ratner than certain other government entities have been.
Posted by eric at 9:32 AM
The Yankees deal gets some more scrutiny, AY gets a mention
Atlantic Yards Report
Coverage is given to yesterday's Democracy Now! broadcast which included a segment on public subsidies for sports complexes. Congressional scrutiny into funding for the new Yankee Stadium might effect how the proposed Nets arena could be financed.
The program was hosted by Juan Gonzalez and included Congressman Dennis Kucinich, Good Jobs New York's Bettina Damani and Field of Schemes author Neil deMause.
The Atlantic Yards mention is included in this quote from Kucinich:
I can say that my subcommittee staff… is in contact with officials from both the city of New York and the New York Yankees to discuss their potential appearance in front of our Congressional subcommittee. I think that it’s very important to understand that we’re looking at a public policy matter here that relates not only to New York and not only to the Nets and the Atlantic Yard project, but it also relates to the whole country… because it’s quite possible that there are billions of dollars in tax benefits that should be going to municipalities for the purposes of repairing their infrastructure and for schools and other things and that are instead being diverted for these private sports complexes…
(Emphasis added)
Damiani points out how representatives from outside of New York City are picking up the slack to see if there will really be any benefits from subsidizing sports complexes:
The city has really washed their hands of making sure there’s any accountability on jobs and clear benefits for New Yorkers on the other side of this project, which is very unfortunate. I mean, we’re grateful for Congressman Kucinich and Assembly Member [Richard] Brodsky to get involved in this issue. Neither represent New York City, by the way. New York City elected officials—they’re filling a void, because local elected officials in New York City have refused to get involved in this project. And we need them. We need them to make sure that the promises in the press releases actually turn out to be something that we can hold them accountable for.
NoLandGrab: Many thanks to Rep. Kucinich for running with this issue. Also, thanks to Democracy Now! for examining public subsidies for Yankee Stadium. We're looking forward to more in-depth coverage that will include the proposed Nets arena.
Posted by steve at 6:37 AM
Relief is sought as building costs soar
MetroNY
by Amy Zimmer
The New York Building Congress, of which Forest City Ratner is a member, released a report stating that New York is "one of the most expensive places to build in America."
The report looks suspiciously like a plea for the City to cater to developers as it includes such remedies as rezoning “idle or derelict industrial land.” This sounds uncomfortably like the scheme used by the State for the proposed Atlantic Yards project, where a working railyard and surrounding neighborhood were labeled as "blighted" to allow a land grab by Forest City Ratner.
The report mentions specific projects that the construction industry would like to go forward:
Already such big projects as the Javits Convention Center and the Fulton Street Transit Center have been scaled back because cost estimates far exceeded original estimates. The construction industry is concerned considering other big projects on the drawing board — the Second Avenue Subway, World Trade Center, Moynihan Station and Atlantic Yards.
Posted by steve at 5:56 AM
All Soaped Up And Nowhere To Rinse
The Footprint Gazette
Yesterday, Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner left "FoGazy" and his neighbors high-n-dry, again.
The water was off for roughly two hours and I ended up wiping the soap off my body with a towel. We got an apology, just like the one we got the last time this happened. I'm done with apologies. I want accountability and solutions. This will happen again, and again we'll be apologized to. That's not good enough. Either FCR does their job better or they should be penalized and we should be rewarded for bearing the brunt of their shortcomings.
[Idea for make-busy work for the dog days of summer: Maybe the Atlantic Yards Community Liaison could "liaise" with the community and let them know when their ultilities are gonna be shut off (like, ahead of time, for example).]
Posted by lumi at 4:54 AM
Eminent domain will only be used...
[You know the rest of the punch line.]
...as a last resort.
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Crain's NY Business reports that Queens Borough President Helen Marshall now backs the Willets Point plan with a few caveats, including the old cliché, that the City "use eminent domain only as a last resort." Last we checked, eminent domain is always "used as a last resort" when the threat of eminent domain doesn't work. |
Posted by lumi at 4:33 AM
July 30, 2008
Field of Schemes: Congress Probes How New Sports Stadiums Turn Public Money into Private Profit
A congressional committee is investigating whether New York City and the New York Yankees wildly inflated the value of the site for the team’s new stadium to float nearly $1 billion in tax-free bonds.
Democracy Now
Congressman Dennis Kucinich, Good Jobs New York's Bettina Damani and Field of Schemes author Neil deMause join host Juan Gonzalez to discuss subsidies, funny stadium math — and Atlantic Yards.
REP. DENNIS KUCINICH: I think that it’s very important to understand that we’re looking at a public policy matter here that relates not only to New York and not only to the Nets and the Atlantic Yard project, but it also relates to the whole country, as your other guests have said, because it’s quite possible that there are billions of dollars in tax benefits that should be going to municipalities for the purposes of repairing their infrastructure and for schools and other things and that are instead being diverted for these private sports complexes.
And the question is one of public policy, one of the IRS, and in the case of the New York Yankees, questions of securities law, because of the various amounts of the appraisal, $45 a square foot versus $275 a square foot, which have a bearing on the overall cost of the project. And if the cost of the project is inflated, that’s going to be of interest to the SEC, as well as the IRS.
...JUAN GONZALEZ: Right. And then, of course, the final irony with—because most of these stadiums have luxury boxes that are for corporations that go from $500,000 to $800,000, in the case of the Yankees, per year to rent these boxes, and of course, my newspaper, the Daily News, reported yesterday that in this deal, the City of New York arranged to have its own luxury box at Yankee Stadium available, presumably to city officials, as part of the deal for the financing. Bettina, your response to that?
BETTINA DAMIANI: It’s aptly coined the landlord suite. And it’s just another example of how local elected officials almost seem to be void of feeling that they have responsibility to the public, because they’re going to get nice seats, in the long run.
article/video/audio/download MP3
NoLandGrab: "The landlord suite." Nice. If we taxpayers are funding the lion's share of the costs, doesn't that make us the landlords? That being the case, NLG's got dibs on the first Mets-Yankees inter-league game next season.
Posted by eric at 7:12 PM
In the Pool: Dreams of Atlantic Yards
Gowanus Lounge
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The Atlantic Terminal Mall in summer is a great place to chill and think thoughts about the future. This image comes from Tracy Collins, of course, via our GL Flickr Pool.
NoLandGrab: It may be a great place to chill, but look out if you try to take photos of an anti-Atlantic Yards protest counter-protest.
Posted by eric at 10:06 AM
Typo? City/state letter on tax-exempt bonds backdates MTA RFP by three years
Atlantic Yards Report
Maybe it's just a typo. Maybe it's a calculated slip. But there's another misleading element in a letter that, as I and Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn have contended, deserves serious scrutiny.
The 5/8/08 letter to the Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Treasury Department from the New York City Industrial Development Authority and the Empire State Development Corporation backdates the issuance of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's request for proposals (RFP) for the Vanderbilt Yard by three years, to 5/24/02.
The MTA's RFP was issued on 5/24/05.
...What's the value of the 2002 date, compared to 2005? Well, maybe it's none, given that 2005 still would fall well before the October 2006 cutoff.
Then again, a 2002 date suggests that momentum for the project--which the letter says commenced in 2003--reached back even earlier.
Also, the 2002 date avoids potential consternation should regulators wonder why, if the project began in 2003 and the MOU was signed in February 2005, the Vanderbilt Yard was put out for bid only in May 2005.
That sequencing issue has been at the heart of the AY federal eminent domain case, which was dismissed by a district and appellate court and refused a Supreme Court hearing--but was never really addressed by the courts.
NoLandGrab: Typo or obfuscation? We don't know, but we do know that once the tale-telling starts, it gets easier to do it again and again, and it's been going on with Atlantic Yards since about "May 24, 2002."
Posted by eric at 8:12 AM
The latest dispatches from behind the Green Wall
Though a little shell-shocked, "FoGazy's" sense of humor remains (somewhat) intact as he finds common ground with some residents in Beijing.
Wanna Hear A Joke?
The punch line, "NETS ARENA, 10-30-09!"
A Green Wall Goes Up To Conceal Blight
An article titled "Before Guests Arrive, Beijing Hides Some Messes" appeared in today's New York Times, and it portrayed some pretty striking parallels to what's going on on our block....
Between the Green Wall and the "bullydozers," the comparisons are eerie.
Posted by lumi at 5:10 AM
It came from the Blogosphere...
Atlantic Yards Report, A modest proposal: Bruce Ratner should bunk on Dean Street
If, despite noise and disruption experienced by residents, daily life is sufficiently tolerable in the Atlantic Yards footprint, as per the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC), perhaps some ESDC officials, joined by representatives of the Bloomberg administration and developer Forest City Ratner, can spend a few nights on Dean Street.
NoLandGrab: And don't forget Brooklyn Borough President and Atlantic Yards Cheerleader in Chief Marty Markowitz.
Brownstoner, Things That Go Bump in the Footprint
Bstoner tidily recaps yesterday's Atlantic Yards Report article about construction impacts and the effects on footprint residents.
The Footprint Gazette blogger added this note in the comments section:
Thanks for the empathy bxgrl. I recently had 2 different out of towners stay with me last week and they were shocked at what we deal with and appalled that this is being allowed to happen.
If you read through Norm Oder's post you can see just how foul this whole thing is. There weren't supposed to be people in these buildings at this stage in the construction, so the necessary measures to make this bearable are not in place.
Needless to say, FCR and Marty Markowitz don't give a damn, and are happy to harass us until we leave.
Posted by lumi at 4:56 AM
Questions Raised Over Financing Deals of New Yankees Stadium
WNYC News Radio
By Matthew Schuerman
Details about the Congressional inquiry into the Yankee Stadium financing might seem a little off-topic, but keep in mind that the Yankees have requested additional bond financing and that Bruce Ratner hopes to take advantage of the same in order to finance the Nets arena.
The story about the Yankees deal took an interesting turn yesterday when WNYC reported the following scoop (full transcript):
The new Yankee Stadium is receiving more than $600 million in city, state and federal subsidies. Almost half of that money came in the form of tax exempt bonds issued by the city's Industrial Development Agency, or IDA. Under the bonding agreement, the IDA would have permanent access to a luxury suite at the new stadium. Westchester Assemblyman Richard Brodsky says the agreement is another reason to question what public interest the new ballpark is serving to deserve such a high level of taxpayer support.
Though a spokesman for the Mayor has said the City hasn't decided whether or not to accept this gift, our guess would be NOT, now that WNYC has blown their cover.
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn explores the possibility of thank-you gifts from Bruce Ratner (link):
If Bruce Ratner ever builds his Barclays Boondoggle Arena (fat chance) one can presume that he'll make a gift of free luxury skyboxes to numerous officials, either because:
1. He owes a lot of people in government for his boondoggle land grab, and/or 2. He can't seem to find buyers for his luxury suites, so why not give them away.
Good Jobs First's blog Clawback is reporting that Bettina Damiani, journalist Neil deMause, columnist Juan Gonzalez and Rep. Kucinich are scheduled to appear this morning to discuss the controversy on Democracy Now (9 a.m. on BCAT channel 34/67.).
Additional Coverage:
AP via amNY
NY assemblyman queries Yankees on stadium subsidy
State Assemblyman Richard Brodsky wants the New York Yankees to explain why the proposed value for land under Yankee Stadium appears inflated in an Internal Revenue Service tax estimate.
He also wants to know if the city agencies considering the team's request for public funds will get a luxury suite in the new stadium.
The Westchester Democrat raised the questions in a letter to Yankees' President Randy Levine released Monday. Brodsky has questioned the Yankees' request to subsidize the new stadium using $336 million in public funds issued by the city's Industrial Development Agency.
...
"This goes to the heart of whether it is a public project or a private project," Brodsky said in an interview. He said his review of documents concerning the project differ from public comments about the deal that would use public support to help the Yankees build their new stadium in the Bronx.
Newsday via amNY
Panel to probe land appraisals for Yankee Stadium
A congressional subcommittee hearing centered on the use of public financing to build sports complexes like the new Yankee Stadium was postponed, allowing the panel to probe deeper into why the value of land under the Bronx stadium appeared inflated on tax reports, an official said Tuesday.
The Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee -- chaired by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) -- had scheduled the hearing Wednesday. It's now planned for sometime in September.
On Friday, Kucinich sent letters to Yankee officials, the Internal Revenue Service and various city agencies inquiring about the accuracy of land appraisals reported to the IRS. In the letter, he requested documentation detailing land value estimates and how they were calculated. He wanted the documents no later than Aug. 6.
But Assemb. Richard Brodsky (D-Westchester) had already obtained some of the information Kucinich had sought and on Monday released land value estimates he said bared discrepancies.
...
Kucinich, a longtime skeptic of public subsidies for sports complexes, and Brodsky, a critic of public authorities, have questioned the Yankees' request for an additional $336 million in tax-free bonds to help complete the new $1.3-billion stadium. The Mets are also seeking about $52 million more in tax-exempt-bond financing for its new stadium. Brodsky, who earlier this month held a hearing in Manhattan on tax-free-bond financing, said he was invited to testify in the September hearing.
Posted by lumi at 4:38 AM
Forest City in the News
mffais.com, Forest City Enterprises Inc (FCYA.BE) more shares bought by California State Teachers Retirement System
California State Teachers Retirement System added additional 7,792 (6.59 %) shares of Forest City Enterprises Inc (FCYA.BE), bringing their current holdings to 126,018 shares as shown by filings made public on 2008-07-28.
Tampa Tribune, Shops At Wiregrass Tenants Unveiled
The developers of the Shops at Wiregrass confirmed on Tuesday a number of tenants for their plaza that's slated to open Oct. 30.
...
The list confirmed Tuesday included: Pottery Barn, Williams-Sonoma, Yamato Japanese Steak House, Cantina Laredo and Brass Tap pub and brewery.Also on the list were American Greetings, Aveda, Brown Shoe Closet, Cacique, Christopher & Banks, Hollister, Hot Topic, Juice Zone, Learning Express, Limited Too, Put A Cork In It and Stride Rite.
The developers of the mall, Cleveland-based Forest City Enterprises and West Palm Beach-based Goodman Co., are overseeing construction of the eastern leg of State Road 56. The first portion of the $25 million, six-lane road must be finished before the mall can open.
St. Petersburg Times, Tenant list grows at Wiregrass
Three restaurants and 14 home decor, fashion and beauty retailers are joining the tenant roster at the Shops at Wiregrass, developers Forest City Commercial Development and the Goodman Co. announced today.
SouthtownStar.com, Mayor: Loss of Von Maur won't hurt New Lenox mall project
[A] would-be retail anchor store at one of New Lenox's new malls has announced it will instead build a store in Joliet. But New Lenox Mayor Tim Baldermann isn't drawing any connections or worrying too much about the department store's change of plans.
"It's not tit for tat," he said of Von Maur's announcement last week that it will pull out of the Forest City shopping center at U.S. 6 and Interstate 355 and instead build a new upscale department store about five miles down Interstate 80 at the Bridge Street Town Centre in Joliet.
...
The Forest City project - dubbed The Birches - will have 1.5 million square feet of retail space with three high-end retail anchors, according to the mayor. It's expected to draw shoppers from eastern and northern Will County and the western collar counties, while Joliet's mall will serve western and southern Will County, he said.
Posted by lumi at 4:22 AM
July 29, 2008
Glaring gap: AY EIS ignored noise, vibration, disruptions faced by footprint residents
Atlantic Yards Reoprt
Maybe the authors of the Atlantic Yards Environmental Impact Study and the Empire State Development Corporation assumed that all of the remaining residents and property owners in the footprint of Bruce Ratner's controversial project would be driven out by the time construction started.
Grating, honking noise from construction equipment. Vibrations that shake buildings, enforcing a 7 a.m. wake-up call. Cracks in building walls and steps. Dust and dislodged paint in the house. Unsavory diesel and sewer aromas. Surprise cutoffs of water and gas. Long waits for restoration of utilities.
That’s life some days for the people--fewer than two dozen--living on the north side of Dean Street between Flatbush and Sixth Avenues in the Atlantic Yards footprint, as massive construction equipment is used to upgrade water and sewer connections destined to help service an 18,000-seat arena and thousands of apartments.
Here’s the catch: the Empire State Development Corporation’s (ESDC) voluminous environmental review, required to disclose the potential impacts of the project, said nothing about the impact on those in the footprint, whether residents or those working at or visiting Freddy’s Bar & Backroom, on the corner.
The Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS), which detailed the potential impact of the project, did acknowledge that construction activities might be “perceptible and annoying in buildings very close to a construction site.” But it didn’t acknowledge that some “very close” buildings might be on the north side of Dean Street, destined to be demolished for the project.
Read the rest of the article, which contrasts the impacts outlined in the Environmental Impact Statement with the reality of unscheduled utility shutoffs, cracking buildings, and the 345C L Hydraulic Excavator, plus bonus coverage of what our elected and appointed officials are doing about it.
Posted by lumi at 4:40 AM
Accountable Development Working Group Meets this Wednesday
From Best View in Brooklyn:
The Accountable Development Working Group meets monthly to discuss and plot action around various development issues affecting Central and South Brooklyn.
This Wednesday's agenda includes presentations from Assembly Member Jeffries’ and Assembly Member Brennan’s offices on legislation to reform the Atlantic Yards project.
The meeting begins at 6 PM on Wednesday, July 30th. Join the Working Group at 621 DeGraw Street (near 4th Ave. ) It is sponsored by the 5th Avenue Committee. Call or email Dave Powell at 718 237-2017 ext 148 or dpowell@fifthave.org for more information.
Posted by lumi at 4:35 AM
Forest City in the News
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Summit meeting today on fate of casino
Last year, Forest City Enterprises participated in one of two losing bids for the Pittsburgh slot-machine casino license. Now that the winning bidder can't get the financing to complete the project, there's a lot of handwringing going on.
Representatives of the two losing bidders for the license Mr. Barden won -- Isle of Capri and Forest City Enterprises -- would not say yesterday whether they would be interested in competing again.
"It's not an issue. It's not a question. There's a license. Someone has it. The board is deciding what to do with it," said Albert Ratner, Forest City co-chairman.
CnewsPubs.com, Shops at Wiregrass: Moe’s, Grillsmith, BJ Brewhouse, Yamato’s, Cantina
WESLEY CHAPEL – Thirteen restaurants and bars ranging from Mexican to Japanese to a brewhouse are beginning to ask for permits for the fall opening of The Shops at Wiregrass, Pasco’s second regional mall opening later this year.
...
Forest City Enterprises, based in Cleveland, and The Goodman Co., based in West Palm Beach, are developing the 800,000-square-foot Shops at Wiregrass mall.
fibre2fashion.com, Department store chain Gottschalks sells its Palmdale Store
Gottschalks Inc announced that the Company has entered into a purchase agreement to sell its wholly-owned store in the Antelope Valley Mall in Palmdale, California, to Forest City Enterprises, a Cleveland, Ohio-based real estate management and development company.
Posted by lumi at 4:01 AM
July 28, 2008
THAT '70S WOE IN RERUN
GOV WARNING OF WORST ECONOMY IN DECADES
NY Post
by Fredric U. Dicker
The Post's political maven claims an exclusive on the news that Governor Paterson is going to toss a bucketful of cold water on New York's already-ailing economic psyche.
Gov. Paterson, convinced the state faces its worst fiscal crisis since the mid-1970s, will deliver the grim news in an unprecedented special address to New Yorkers as soon as tomorrow night, The Post has learned.
The governor's address - which his aides hope will be televised by public and cable news stations - will say that plunging state revenues will force painful cuts in state services, necessitate a reduction in the state work force, possibly through layoffs, and require other difficult economic measures, source said.
Paterson is also expected to announce that he's ordered state agencies to slash spending beyond the relatively modest 3.3 percent cuts he ordered in late spring.
NoLandGrab: So, what'll it be? We need this luxury-suite-filled arena more than ever in these tough economic times? Or, Atlantic Yards, an unsupportable commitment of public funds at a time when we all need to be tightening our belts? You can bet that Forest City Ratner's lobbying machine is going all out to convince the Gov that the Net's net is positive for state coffers.
Posted by eric at 12:38 PM
AY is a project, not a place (again)
Atlantic Yards Report
The media watchdog's work is never done.
From today's New York Post, in an article headlined LANDMARKS BLOOMBLITZ:
The proposed historic designation for Prospect Heights would cover a neighborhood bordering the megadevelopment at Atlantic Yards. Similarly, the West Chelsea district abuts the massive Hudson Yards project.No, Atlantic Yards is a project, not a place. And nearly all of the project would be in Prospect Heights.
Posted by eric at 12:00 PM
Congress probing whether city wildly inflated value of land for new stadium
NY Daily News
by Juan Gonzalez
The News columnist probes two divergent opinions of the value of the land underlying the new Yankee Stadium — both emanating from New York City officials!
A Congressional committee has launched a probe into whether the city and Yankees wildly inflated the value of the site for the team's new stadium to float nearly $1 billion in tax-free bonds.
Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) last week demanded "specific documents and reports" that could show the city claimed the land beneath the new Yankee stadium was worth nearly seven times its true value.
The massive switcheroo allowed the city to sell $941 million in bonds for the stadium, which must by law be linked to a site's actual value.
...Kucinich, who heads the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, is zeroing in on dramatically different estimates the city offered for the stadium land - one of $275 per square foot and another of just $45. A hearing is set for September.
...Why such wildly different values for the same property?
"Our assessors jacked up the numbers and the comparables for the Council to justify the stadium bonds," said a Finance Department official familiar with the project.
NoLandGrab: Vacant land in the Bronx? $275 per square foot.
Vacant land in the Bronx? $45 per square foot.
The possibility of the United States Congress denying tax-exempt financing to the Yankees, Mets and Atlantic Yards developer and Nets owner Bruce Ratner? Priceless.
Posted by eric at 11:43 AM
AY advertising, FCR branding, and the Manhattan Media connection
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder speculates that the Atlantic Yards ad in Manhattan Media's "family lifestyle" magazine could be a makegood of sorts for Forest City Ratner's not-so-fondly remembered original foray into fake newspapers, the Brooklyn Standard.
What's a generic Atlantic Yards advertisement--featuring some dubious statements used to promote the project even before it was passed--doing in the July 2008 issue of New York Family/Brooklyn, "a glossy, vibrant city magazine that offers active, sophisticated New York parents an inviting mix of feature articles and selected tips about their interests, issues, and concerns"?
Well, the magazine comes from none other than Manhattan Media, the enterprise that previously teamed with developer Forest City Ratner on the short-lived but much-criticized Brooklyn Standard "publication." Forest City Ratner initially pledged publication "every few months."
NoLandGrab: OK, we have to admit it. We thought the fake news in the Brooklyn Standard was as well done as the fake news in The Onion.
Posted by eric at 11:07 AM
Where the Mobil station stood, an empty lot
Atlantic Yards Report
Less than a year ago, there was a busy (but blighted!) Mobil station at the northwest corner of Flatbush Avenue and Dean Street.
It closed around December and, as the wide-angle photo below from Tracy Collins shows, it's all been cleared.
Posted by lumi at 5:05 AM
Kucinich probes PILOTS for sports venues
Representative Dennis Kucinich is looking into whether or not the Yankees tailored the valuation of the team's new stadium in order to justify the amount of tax-free bond financing.
This additional scrutiny of Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOTS) could affect Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards arena, since he's seeking the same type of bond financing, which could save him perhaps as much as $165 million.
Reuters (via Yahoo), Rep. Kucinich probes Yankee Stadium debt data
Dennis Kucinich, the Democratic Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a statement that he "has broadened the Subcommittee's investigation of tax-exempt public financing of professional sports stadiums to include specific document requests relating to the valuation of the new Yankee Stadium."
The Yankees, which have won 26 World Series titles and are one of the world's richest professional sports teams, want a city agency to sell $350 million of extra bonds to help finance their new home.
But the Internal Revenue Service must approve the new debt. It stiffened its rules after $941 million of stadium bonds were sold for the Yankees in 2006.
The Yankees repay the bonds that were sold by making so-called payments in lieu of taxes. If the land and buildings are overvalued, the city agency can sell more debt because the payments in lieu of taxes can be higher.
...
The bond issue has gained new currency because the New Jersey Nets basketball team, who plan to move to a new stadium in Brooklyn, New York, also want the IRS to let a city agency sell more than $800 million of tax-free bonds for them. The new arena for the Nets would anchor a big development now struggling in a cooling real estate market.
MetroNY, Yankee Stadium’s worth?
To get the financing, the Yankees needed to pay off the debt with payments in lieu of property taxes, though the team has never paid property taxes. If the Yankees did pay property taxes, the IBO said, the amount would fall $29 million short of what the team needed to satisfy the debt. The city disagreed: The stadium would be valued at $1 billion, and the land underneath it was worth $200 million.
But a much lower number was offered when the city got that land appraised to satisfy a federal requirement to replace parkland with property of equal value. In a second set of appraisals obtained by NYC Park Advocates, the value of Macombs Dam Park was put at $21 million, just below the $25 million total of the replacement parcels.
...
The probe likely won’t affect the $943 million in tax-exempt bonds the Yankees have already sold, but it could stop the team — and the Mets and Nets — from getting similar financing.
Atlantic Yards Report covers the Metro coverage.
Posted by lumi at 4:44 AM
Forest City's New Rochelle project faces hurdles
The Real Deal
By Marc Ferris
Another controversial and possibly eminent-domain-abusing megaproject brought to you by the family from Forest City:
By any measure, Forest City Residential's proposed $450 million, 26-acre Echo Bay development in New Rochelle is a challenging one.
Extensive contamination requires a $20 million remediation, according to a city estimate. Although the site on Long Island Sound sits on an island-dotted bay that glows during the sunset, it is also located next door to a county wastewater treatment facility. And some local veterans threaten to fight the proposed demolition of the dilapidated armory building on the site.
To pull off the Echo Bay project, in May the city chose Forest City Residential, a division of Cleveland-based Forest City Enterprises, which is also the parent company of Bruce Ratner's Forest City Ratner.
The possible use of eminent domain looms if property owners refuse to sell to Forest City Residential, much like Forest City Ratner relied on seizing private property for its massive and controversial Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn. The Ratner family is probably feeling confident following the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection last month of a petition by Atlantic Yards opponents. That petition would have granted a hearing to 11 property owners and tenants challenging the government's ability to seize private homes for development.
Forest City is no stranger in Westchester. Bruce Ratner managed to overcome strong opposition to Ridge Hill Village, the largest development project ever built in Yonkers.
Posted by lumi at 3:57 AM
July 27, 2008
Myrtle Ave. condo/supermarket project stalls, leaving just an empty space
NY Daily News
JOTHAM SEDERSTROM
The Myrtle Ave. project's crumbling comes as the shaky economy has sent shivers through the real estate industry and put other large city projects in jeopardy. In Brooklyn, the controversial Atlantic Yards and Coney Island projects have faced delays and reductions in size.Catsimatidis' project is facing the same fate.
"The economy soured, and he can't get municipal bonds to get the affordable housing," said Councilwoman Letitia James (WFP-Prospect Heights), an early supporter of Catsimatidis' project because of the affordable housing.
Posted by amy at 11:05 AM
Talk to the (NY Times) Newsroom: unanswered questions about Atlantic Yards coverage
Atlantic Yards Report writes to the NY Times Metro Editor during "Talk to the Newsroom" week, and receives no response.
Mr. Sexton,In a previous "Talk to the Newsroom" feature, in March 2007, you wrote, "Pick any major topic of the last several years in New York... The paper's coverage has been unmatched."
I'd strongly disagree with that regarding Atlantic Yards. In fact, I'd argue, the Times has a special obligation to be exacting in its coverage, given the parent company's business relationship with Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner, as partners on the Times Tower. (I wrote about that in a September 2005 report critiquing the Times, linked from my web site, and have continued my media criticism as part of my Atlantic Yards Report watchdog blog.)
Posted by amy at 10:58 AM
July 26, 2008
Weds. 7/30: 4 Borough Meets in Queens with special presentation on Atlantic Yards
The next Four Borough Neighborhood Preservation Alliance meeting is coming up. Here are the details:
Wednesday July 30, 2008
Queens Borough Hall
6 pm - Legislative Committee
6:30 - 7:45 - Corporation meeting (discussing our recent election and bylaws)
7:45-9:00 - Foundation Meeting including a presentation and discussion with advocates for community input in the Atlantic Yards proposal
Directions: Take the E/F to Kew Gardens/Union Turnpike
All are welcome!
Your chance to discuss Atlantic Yards with the Council of Brooklyn Neighborhoods
Posted by amy at 1:01 PM
Was Yankee Stadium value "gamed" to issue PILOTs? Congressional probe could affect AY
Atlantic Yards Report
Was the valuation of the new Yankee Stadium "gamed" so that the foregone taxes exceeded the expected bond payments, thus allowing a PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes) financing deal?That's the subtext of the inquiry launched yesterday by the Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which in March 2007 and October 2007 held hearings regarding tax-exempt financing for sports facilities.
And should the subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), find the procedures sketchy, that could cast doubt on similar financing plans for Atlantic Yards arena and the new Mets stadium.
Posted by amy at 12:58 PM
Burden: The Bloomberg Administration "committed to preserving neighborhood character"
DDDB.net
The City Council has fixed arcane zoning laws, now protecting Carroll Gardens from overdevelopment. Bravo.But in the Times's coverage of the Council vote, City Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden offered this whopper:
New Limits on Builders in an Area of Brooklyn...Ms. Burden said the change in the Carroll Gardens zoning rules demonstrated the Bloomberg administration’s commitment to preserving neighborhood character.
That's excepting Prospect Heights, West Harlem, Willets Point, Queens West, Coney Island, the Bronx's Macombs Dam Park area, Jamaica, the Lower East Side, Downtown Brooklyn, etc. etc...
Posted by amy at 12:49 PM
Church vs. Commerce: Parishioners Try to Take the Brooklyn Flea Down
Racked has a full report from a very heated meeting about the Brooklyn Flea in Fort Greene. The only thing that seemed to bring the room together was an enthusiastic condemnation of Ratner's penchant for big box stores:
State Senator Velmanette Montgomery really stole the show, though, and got folks excited. "I fought against the stadium here," Montgomery said. "This is different. What is suffering in this city and state right now is small business. I'd rather support small businesses than Ratner," she said, and the whole room erupted in applause. "We have lost so many of our small businesses because we don't have the foot traffic...I want buses to stop and spend some money!" More cheering. "These big boxes are running us over!" The room went wild. Everyone can agree about that, right?
Posted by amy at 12:37 PM
July 25, 2008
On further review, O'Malley got bum rap
Case can be made that Dodgers owner was pushed
Albany Times-Union
by Brian Ettkin
In a lengthy and interesting piece on Walter O'Malley on the cusp of the former Brooklyn (and L.A.) Dodgers' owner's enshrinement in baseball's Hall of Fame, reporter Brian Ettkin repeats the too-often repeated error about the precise location of the Ebbets Field successor that never came to be, with a twist.
O'Malley continued asking for help to acquire the Atlantic and Flatbush site (where Bruce Ratner would build Atlantic Yards five decades later).
Ettkin is actually right about the location for Atlantic Yards, but he's wrong about O'Malley, who actually wanted to build on the spot that's now home to Ratner's Atlantic Center mall. He's also off on his phraseology — "would build" is different than "wants to build."
The article does offer up a number of good tidbits, including:
O'Malley offered to build a 100-percent privately financed Major League Baseball stadium, the first since Yankee Stadium had been constructed in 1923, and the land once the city acquired it.
While O'Malley's willingness to privately finance the ballpark was much different than Ratner's dependence on subsidies, O'Malley's plan, like Ratner's, relied on the use of eminent domain.
Moses considered big-league sports of minimal value to a city.
In that respect, Moses and many economists would agree.
[T]he Chavez Ravine stadium deal wasn't valid until a vote of the people narrowly passed it on June 3, 1958, and even then O'Malley had to win several court appeals filed by stadium opponents.
Unlike residents of New York City, Angelenos actually got to vote on the Dodgers' stadium plan.
Posted by eric at 12:30 PM
MAAC Madness in Albany
Th Full-Court Press
As promised, The Press is diving into the future of the MAAC tournament. Here’s how we’ll do it: Each day, we’ll take a look at one of the sites that is likely to be in the running to host the tournament from 2012-14.
...Since no decisions have been made and no official negotiations have taken place, none of the sites we’re going to look into are guaranteed to be hosts at any times. By the same token, just because we don’t examine a particular city doesn’t mean that city has no shot at being a host. But eight sites appear to be on the MAAC’s radar, and those are the ones The Press will delve into: Albany; Bridgeport; Buffalo; Mohegan Sun; the Atlantic Yards arena in Brooklyn; the Prudential Center and Meadowlands in Newark and East Rutherford; Atlantic City; and the Baltimore Inner Harbor.
NoLandGrab: Good thing the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference didn't book its conference basketball tournament in Brooklyn for the arena's originally projected opening season of 2006-2007. We have to think that the Barclays Center is not the favorite to host the tourney, since, unlike the other contenders, it doesn't actually exist.
We'll post The Full-Court Press's report on Brooklyn's chances when it's published.
Posted by eric at 12:01 PM
In downtown Anaheim, the false promises accompanying Gehry's (nice) ice rink
Atlantic Yards Report
There's no doubt that Norman Oder is the ultimate Atlantic Yards tourist. This month he paid a visit to the Frank Gehry-designed practice facility for the Anaheim Ducks and filed a report.
It's not directly related to Atlantic Yards, but a look at Frank Gehry’s ice rink in Anaheim, CA, originally dubbed Disney Ice and now called Anaheim Ice, offers a cautionary tale about promises made for ambitious architecture.
Notably, the structure, when it opened in 1995, did not contain some of the Gehryesque elements announced, it did not prompt the redevelopment of nearby parcels, and, counter to the expectations of its builders, it did not spawn a national effort to teach inner-city youths ice hockey.
...
Notably, the Times review was written when the building was about to go into construction, not after it opened and was used. Thus Muschamp could gush about the building as a piece of sculpture, not a messy, living thing with blank walls backing into a major avenue, though years later, as the photo shows, there's a new development (at right in picture) bordering the rink.Similarly, he could proclaim, improbably at the time and incredibly in retrospect--that the Atlantic Yards arena, as designed, would be an “urban garden.” (Now even the promised green roof is gone.)
NoLandGrab: Oder was more impressed by the interior design of Gehry's ice rink than the outside, another possible omen for the Atlantic Yards arena.
Posted by lumi at 4:44 AM
Of course, Marty isn’t running — why should he?
The Brooklyn Paper, Letter to the Editor
To the editor,
Your front page story last week about Borough President Markowitz’s supposed flirtation with a run for higher office (“Beep’s run done? Expert: Marty ain’t raising money,” July 19) gives too much credit to Markowitz. Seriously, does anyone think that Brooklyn’s buffoon is actually running for mayor?
Perhaps Marty is the only one who thinks he’s fit for a promotion, but the rest of us think he’s a joke. From his steadfast pigheadedness on Atlantic Yards — that state-sponsored boondoggle whose failure makes Markowitz look dumber and dumber — to his seeming belief that the loudest person in the room must be the smartest, Markowitz reminds me day in and day out that New York can do better.
I do confess that if it weren’t for term limits, I would again vote for him for Beep. The job has no authority, so it’s perfect for this toothless tiger.
Jerry Siemens, Greenpoint
Posted by lumi at 4:39 AM
Forest City in the News
Crain's Chicago Business, Von Maur plans Joliet store, won't open in New Lenox
Von Maur has signed a letter of intent to open a store at a proposed mega-mall in Joliet, while the upscale department store chain has decided against a store at a proposed center in nearby New Lenox.
...
The decision comes as a big blow for the Birches of New Lenox, a 1.1 million-square-foot mall proposed by Cleveland-based Forest City Enterprises Inc. Because of the slowdown in the retail and housing markets, the mall’s opening was already pushed back a year to 2011.A local developer working with Forest City on the project had said Von Maur had agreed to purchase its site there. But Mr. von Maur says the retailer never signed a letter of intent for the Birches project, and never had a binding contract there.
A Forest City spokeswoman and local executive didn’t return calls seeking comment.
Larchmont Gazette, Parking Deck and Apartment Project Transferred to Iron Oak
At the July 9 meeting, developers from Forest City Mamaroneck successfully petitioned the board to authorize the transfer of both the parking deck and the related apartment project to another entity – Iron Oak of Westchester. Both Town Administrator Steve Altieri and Town Counsel Bill Maker assured the board and residents that a contract with Iron Oak Partners would not in any way change any of the prior agreements with Forest City. The design, materials and number and types of apartments and parking spots would remain the same. However, Mr. Maker was able to negotiate an additional clause calling for the creation of a $4 million escrow account for the completion of the parking deck by April 14, 2009. Work on the housing part of the project is to begin in 45 days.
...
As readers of the Gazette are aware, the Town Board has been working with the Forest City organization for a number of years in an effort to build housing units on Madison Avenue and a parking deck on Myrtle Boulevard. The agreement consummated in October 2006 called for Forest City to finance and construct a parking deck on Myrtle Boulevard with no expense to the Town. That responsibility has now been assumed by Iron Oak.
Posted by lumi at 4:09 AM
July 24, 2008
FALLING ACORN! HOW FAR FROM THE TREE?
Noticing New York
Michael White digs into the recently unearthed ACORN scandal — and scores points for a witty headline.
Do you know about ACORN’s top-management cover-up of a million dollar embezzlement? The cover-up discovered just a few days ago lasted for eight years. I am figuring our local state and city government officials must now be in a tizzy evaluating what to do about the national housing and advocacy group.
...As with any cover-up, the standard questions need to be trotted out for the standard basic investigative due diligence. Who knew what, and when did they know it?
Who needs to be asking those questions? Any government agency that has been doing business with ACORN, is currently doing business with ACORN, or may have planned to do business with ACORN.
In New York, we’ve definitely got some of those agencies. And in New York, there is another set of impinging questions that must, perforce, be examined concerning ACORN and the proposed $4.4 billion Atlantic Yards megadevelopment which ACORN has complicitly helped design as a subsidy sponge. A bunch of New York State agencies are going to have to ask these questions and the rest of us in the broader New York community are going to be wanting answers too.
Posted by eric at 12:46 PM
July JOBS and SCHOLARSHIPS
Diversity in the Arts
PROJECT COORDINATOR:
The Civilians is looking for a Project Coordinator for their upcoming project, working title Atlantic Yards. Based on a process developed by The Civilians over seven years, the project will begin in November with an Investigative Phase involving artists and students conducting interviews with community members and those who have a stake, on one side or the other, in the Atlantic Yards Development in Brooklyn. At the end of this six week Phase, artists will join with community members and present a series of short form laboratory pieces based on the interviews and materials gathered. This lab presentation will ultimately feed a full-length work.
...The position will begin in early-mid September and will be a full-time three-month position through mid-December. Salary is $615 a week. Applicants should have experience with both administrative positions as well as community based work and be comfortable with both office and field work. Applicants of color are strongly encouraged.
Posted by eric at 12:01 PM
Historic preservation, theory and practice
Atlantic Yards Report responds to a NoLandGrab post:
No Land Grab points out the irony of Forest City Ratner sponsoring an AIANY (American Institute of Architects-New York) panel on historic preservation. I'll remind people that parent Forest City Enterprises embraces historic preservation, just not in Brooklyn.
NoLandGrab: Irony or rank hypocrisy, it explains why no amount of preservation press elsewhere in the nation has managed to improve Bruce Ratner's standing as the Dark Lord of Overdevelopment.
Posted by lumi at 4:35 AM
Looking back at the unanticipated impacts of the Downtown Brooklyn rezoning
Today, Atlantic Yards Report crosses Flatbush to assess a recently released report about the real impacts of the Downtown Brooklyn rezoning.
It’s well-known that the 2004 Downtown Brooklyn rezoning resulted in some very different outcomes than expected, given that the hot residential real estate market, coupled with changes in the back-office needs of large companies in Manhattan, made it far more lucrative to build luxury housing (and hotels) than the office space (and jobs) that the rezoning was intended to foster.
A new report, Downtown Brooklyn’s Detour: The Unanticipated Impacts of Rezoning and Development on Residents and Businesses, prepared by the Pratt Center for Community Development for FUREE (Families United for Racial and Economic Equality), points out how much has changed in four years, raising concerns about the displacement of lower-income retail and residential tenants. It doesn’t suggest particular strategies, however. (Solutions aren’t simple; perhaps that’ll be another report.)
The report does remind us that an EIS (environmental impact statement) is hardly infallible, as we’ve also learned in the case of Atlantic Yards, where the EIS anticipated a ten-year project buildout that seems deeply divorced from reality.
Posted by lumi at 4:31 AM
Forest City in the News
Cleveland Plain Dealer, Forest City revamps proposal for riverfront convention center
The cost of building a riverfront convention center will exceed the $400 million cap set by the county, even with a substantial redesign.
Forest City Commercial Group reworked its plans for a convention center after updated estimates put the cost at more than half a billion dollars.
David LaRue, the company's chief operating officer, said Monday the redesign could shave up to $100 million in construction costs. Still, the company doesn't think it can meet the county's cap.
LaRue wouldn't give the latest project estimate but said it was "within the ballpark."
The Cleveland Free Times, Payrolls And Politics
Forest City unveiled its new design for the planned convention center. To shave a few pennies off the half-billion-dollar, publicly funded construction project, which the residents of Cleveland balked at, they decided to get rid of the stilts and not charge the county for "air rights." Um, thanks?
Posted by lumi at 3:55 AM
July 23, 2008
Say What: Vanderbilt Yards Parking Restrictions
Gowanus Lounge
This amusing image from the Vanderbilt Yards (aka Atlantic Yards site) comes to us courtesy of Tracy Collins via our GL Flickr Pool. Whatever you do, do not park in this spot. For many reasons, all of them having nothing to do with the fallen sign.
NoLandGrab: And speaking about parking, Tracy Collins informs us that Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner has already turned the recently demolished 640 Pacific St. into a private parking lot.
Posted by lumi at 8:18 PM
Notes from the Underground
The Footprint Gazette
Dear Diary,
Its day 844. My walls are beginning to crack and lately the ceiling has been showing up on the floor. I'm worried for our safety. Sleep has become a luxury, so frequently interrupted by the clanging of metal and the pounding of earth from what I remember fondly as 'outside'. We're blocked in now.
Click here to read the rest of the latest lonely dispatch from the heart of Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards footprint and find out what Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz is doing to help the survivors.
Posted by lumi at 8:02 PM
So Soon? Fares and Tolls Rise in M.T.A. Plan
The NY Times
By William Neuman
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority will propose a substantial increase in transit fares and bridge and tunnel tolls next year to help close a widening budget gap of nearly $900 million, according to an official at the authority.
Though the precise amount of the fare and toll increase has yet to be determined, the authority will seek to increase the revenue it gets from those sources by 8 percent. If approved by the authority’s board, the increase would take effect next July and would follow a toll and fare increase in March of this year.
In the more than 100-year history of the subway, the fare has gone up in consecutive years only once before, in 1980 and 1981.
NoLandGrab: Meanwhile, Bruce Ratner's bid for the Vanderbilt Railyards is still $114.5 million below the MTA's own appraisal and $50 million less than the bid submitted by Extell — go figure.
Posted by lumi at 7:48 PM
Credit crunch threatens Gehry's Hove scheme
Frank Gehry's controversial scheme for the Hove sea front has been thrown into doubt because of the credit crunch.
BD Online
by Marguerite Lazell
Looks like starchitect Frank Gehry's controversial design for an English waterfront development is going the way of the global credit crunch.
On Tuesday, Gehry confirmed his involvement with the project was over. In an interview in the Guardian with BD columnist Jonathan Glancey, he said: "Don’t go there. It was a painful experience. I guess I never did understand your planning system and all those interfering government design advisers."
Aghiros commented that the King Alfred project was not the sort of scheme Gehry was used to working on.
"The major projects that Frank Gehry has done have been funded by philanthropists, or institutions," he said. “This is a commercial proposition that needs to stand on its own feet. If it’s viable we’ll proceed.”
NoLandGrab: Since the "scheme" Gehry is working on in Brooklyn is being funded in large part by the taxpayers, he may still be able to put that where-have-I-seen-that-before" design to work. Much in the same way that Ratner's hired sports economist Andy Zimbalist allegedly changed the name "Los Angeles Angels" to "Seattle Supersonics" to produce a report on the economic impact of the latter, it appears that Frank Gehry may be recycling ideas, perhaps with a twist, literally, of the building now known as "B1."
Separated at death?
Posted by eric at 6:51 PM
Real Estate Sits Out '08 Race—For Now
NY Observer
by Dana Rubinstein
[P]erhaps what’s most striking about the real estate industry’s behavior in 2008 is its utter lack of political activity. In marked contrast to 2007, when New Yorkers had two hometown heroes running for the nation’s highest office, donations have dried up.
There are a few exceptions—the organic-farming landlord Douglas Durst recently donated $1,000 to Obama; dynasties the LeFraks and the Trumps have this year shown consistent support for McCain (both families declined to comment). But they’re outweighed by the silent majority of 2008, which has sat on the sidelines, its closed wallet planted firmly underneath its ambivalent behind, donating nary a penny to either the Obama or the McCain camp.
That majority includes SL Green’s chairman, Stephen Green; the Olnick family; Related’s chairman and CEO, Stephen Ross, and president, Jeff Blau; Jack and William Rudin; Tishman Speyer’s Jerry and Rob Speyer and Robert Tishman; Brookfield Properties’ president and CEO, Ric Clark; Boston Properties’ CEO and director, Edward Linde; Extell Development’s president, Gary Barnett; Harry and Billy Macklowe; Larry Silverstein; Bruce Ratner; Sheldon Solow; and, aside from one bizarre $2,300 donation to Mike Huckabee in January, Arthur and William Zeckendorf.
That may soon change. The Obama campaign is making a serious effort to reach out to the industry.
NoLandGrab: Atlantic Yards watchers know that when searching for campaign donations from Bruce Ratner, the key is to check for contributions from Bruce's brother Michael, sister-in-law Karen Ranucci, and other relatives.
As for Barack Obama's reaching out to the real estate industry, that doesn't exactly add up to "change we can believe in." The industry might be slow to open its collective wallet, however, since the Democratic Presidential candidate is on record as opposing the Supreme Court's decision in Kelo vs. New London.
Posted by eric at 4:15 PM
Historic Preservation Faces Sustainability Hurdles
eOculus [AIA NY Newsletter]
by Jessica Sheridan
Shamelessness or unintended irony? Forest City Ratner sponsored a recent American Institute of Architects NY Chapter forum on historic preservation.
Historic preservation projects tend to take on one of two forms: mimicry and transformation. Architects on a recent panel agreed that successful projects are a result of the latter, and in each of their practices, they strive to reduce a building to its essence, relate it to its context, and preserve its remains yet develop practical uses for the future.
NoLandGrab: Here's an example of Forest City Ratner "reducing a building to its essence."
Posted by eric at 3:42 PM
Hudson Yards: Review of Development Proposal Designs
Noticing New York
Blogger Michael D.D. White contrasts the Yards Hudson and Atlantic, and the results aren't pretty.
Interestingly, the MTA is NOT maximizing the sales price of the land it is selling in the parallel example of Atlantic Yards. Rather than raise more money for capital or operating expenses the MTA is selling its property to the Atlantic Yards developer at a substantial write-down and collecting far less (hundred’s of millions less) than it could. In the case of the Atlantic Yards site the density of the site is being maxed out to an inappropriate degree, but the real estate value of that extra density that is being created with this maxing out is being given to the Forest City Ratner as the developer of the site rather than being captured by the MTA as in the case of Hudson Yards. (See: Friday, June 27, 2008 “No-property-tax status was supposed to raise the price of the Vanderbilt Yard”)
One last thing on Atlantic Yards, vis-a-vis Hudson Yards: The participation of City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and the other above named political representatives in the Hudson Yards Community Advisory Committee letter on Hudson Yards reveals where Speaker Quinn and the others should stand on the Atlantic Yards. They no doubt know this. There are many parallels between the proposed Hudson Yards and Atlantic Yards projects so that criticisms of Hudson Yards, which is a relatively good project (a high density project in a high density neighborhood), also apply to Atlantic Yards. At the same time, all the ways in which Atlantic Yards is different from Hudson Yards make Atlantic Yards a substantially worse project, probably the worst project being proposed in the City right now.
Posted by eric at 3:25 PM
Ward Bakery Demolition Porn
Gowanus Lounge
 |
Here's a photo by Tracy Collins via Gowanus Lounge of the destruction of the Ward Bakery. Whither the Landmarks Preservation Commission?
Posted by eric at 3:09 PM
P’Heights to get protection?
The Brooklyn Paper
by Sarah Portlock
The city is moving toward protecting a wide swatch of Prospect Heights — but the proposed “historic district” would not bar a project that some neighbors think is the biggest destroyer of the area’s history: Atlantic Yards.
Last week, the Landmarks Preservation Commission began the process of designating approximately 12 blocks in Prospect Heights as a historic district that encompasses 870 buildings from the mid 19th- to early 20th-centuries.
The district would stretch from Flatbush to Washington avenues and from Eastern Parkway to Pacific Street — up to, but not including, Bruce Ratner’s $4-billion mega-development.
That inclusion could have saved the neighborhood — if “it had been done in time,” said Candice Carpenter, a lawyer who has worked with the anti-Atlantic Yards group Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn.
Deciding the boundaries of the proposed historic district is a matter of determining which buildings have a distinct “sense of place” and a coherent streetscape, said Landmarks Preservation Commission spokeswoman Lisi de Bourbon.
“The purpose of our agency is how to protect the historic fabric of the city’s neighborhoods, not to stop development,” de Bourbon said, noting that Landmarks primarily looks at architecture, dates of construction, and the streetscape. “It certainly may have been a part of the motivation of people who wanted us to designate the district, but that’s something that we really can’t consider.”
NoLandGrab: OK, let us get this straight. LPC's role is to protect the worthy "historic fabric" of neighborhoods, unless that pesky fabric lies in the path of mega-developments planned by politically connected developers? The politicization of the LPC is obvious, and cries for an agency with more teeth and independence that could actually save architecturally and historically significant buildings like the Ward Bakery and Spaulding Factory from the likes of Bruce Ratner — and Mayor Bloomberg.
Posted by eric at 11:27 AM
Weiner Likes (Some) Mega-Development in Slow Economy
The Real Estate [NY Observer]
by Eliot Brown and Azi Paybarah
Representative Anthony Weiner, a mayoral hopeful, gave his support for a string of large development projects in the city today, saying they're important in a time of economic uncertainty.
"New York needs to continue to grow–I'm a pro-development guy," he said, speaking at a Crain's breakfast. "If you look at downtown, you look at West Side, you look at Penn Station, you look at Ratner, you look at these things–I think that you're going to see that I'm going to be advocating. I want them to be successful, particularly in this time of slow economic growth."
Then, hitting on his favorite theme, Mr. Weiner said the middle-class does not always see a clear, tangible benefit from the projects, adding, "It does create challenges that we have to solve."
NoLandGrab: In these tough economic times, there's nothing more important than shoveling scarce tax dollars at a basketball arena. Is it any wonder that middle-class New Yorkers — and upper- and working-class NYers, too — are having trouble seeing "a clear, tangible benefit" in that?
Posted by eric at 11:08 AM
Zero Hour in West Harlem
Last big landowner in Columbia’s way braces for Supreme Court fight as state dangles eminent domain
NY Observer
by Eliot Brown
 |
An in-depth look at West Harlem property owner Nick Sprayregen's legal battle to save his property from eminent domain seizure for the benefit of Columbia University offers an update on Bruce Ratner's legal bills.
NEW YORK'S LAWS on eminent domain are viewed as rather favorable to the state when compared with other laws nationwide, making the climb for Mr. Sprayregen a distinctly uphill one.
Landowners in other eminent domain cases often hope that a prolonged legal battle will derail a project through a changing political landscape or economic climate. But Columbia’s plan seems prone to more stability than a typical private developer’s. The university has a multibillion dollar endowment; already owns the bulk of the land in the footprint; and has always said the expansion is a long-term proposition, and thus a two-year fight through the court system—landowners in Brooklyn have been challenging eminent domain in the Atlantic Yards project for more than a year and a half—does not seem likely to spoil the university’s plans.
Such a fight can be expensive for both sides. For Atlantic Yards, an Empire State Development Corporation spokesman said the state has spent more than $8 million on legal fees, which apply to litigation and other expenses (the state’s fees are reimbursed by developer Forest City Ratner, and Columbia University will reimburse the state for fees related to eminent domain).
Mr. Sprayregen, who estimated he has spent about $1 million so far in legal expenses and other fees, said he was prepared to commit a substantial sum to continue the fight.
“I think if we’re able to take it all the way to the Supreme Court, it will cost another $2 million,” he said. “Obviously, we now have a real legal fight on our hands.”
NoLandGrab: The Battle of West Harlem may have led to the coining of a new term: "University Blight."
Posted by eric at 10:30 AM
IN THE FRAY: If You Build It, the Jobs Won't Come
The Wall Street Journal
by Mark Yost
More evidence that publicly financed stadiums and arenas are a poor investment for taxpayers, and it's no different in the nation's Capitol.
Just a few years ago, the corner of M Street and New Jersey Avenue was not somewhere you wanted to be after dark. It was part of Washington's notorious Southeast neighborhood, rife with drugs, crime and poverty. But today, about 30,000 baseball fans flock here 80 nights a year to watch the Washington Nationals play in their new $611 million stadium.
While the neighborhood is certainly undergoing a renaissance, what's uncertain is how much credit should go to the ballpark. It's a question that has been debated countless times before, over other stadiums, but the historical evidence is pretty clear.
Sports economists have long argued that publicly financed stadiums are a waste of taxpayer money. And they have the data to prove it.
Yes, stadiums do create high-paying construction jobs for a year or two. But the vast majority of long-term employment is low-wage concession jobs. A Congressional Research Service study of the Baltimore Ravens stadium found that each job created cost the state $127,000. By comparison, Maryland's Sunny Day Fund created jobs for about $6,000 each.
...[U]nder terms of the deal, the city expects to see about $40 million a year in revenue. The smallest portion will come from the team, which is supposed to pay $5.5 million a year in rent. But just this week the Nationals began withholding payments, saying the city had failed to "complete" the stadium.
The vast majority of income is expected to come from the same people who financed the stadium: the taxpayers. An estimated $14 million a year is projected from taxes on tickets, concessions and merchandise. Another $24 million will come from a new stadium tax on D.C. businesses with gross revenues of $3 million or more. Indeed, with the exception of some housing and small businesses that have moved into the neighborhood, the vast majority of the "development" in Southeast is nothing more than taxpayer-funded public works projects.
So in the end, what did the taxpayers get other than a bill for $611 million? The Washington National's Web site advertises jobs for elevator operators, fan ambassadors and security guards. The pay is $7.50-$8.50 an hour.
Posted by eric at 10:03 AM
What's Made Brooklyn Famous (Has Made a Loser Out of Me)
Reason Online
by Damon W. Root
The libertarian blog picks up on The Times's recent coverage of Brooklyn Brewery's real estate woes.
Sunday's New York Times brought word of the latest twist in the saga of New York's Brooklyn Brewery and its president Steve Hindy, purveyors of various fine beers, including the great Black Chocolate Stout. Back in 1996, Hindy and partner Tom Potter set up shop at a former matzo ball factory in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, then a mostly rundown industrial neighborhood but today a thriving hipster paradise, replete with bars, gourmet shops, and luxury condos. The only problem is that now the brewery can't afford to stay. So Hindy looked to city officials for help.
...There's a cautionary tale or two here about getting in bed with city officials and their shady real estate allies, but the worst of it has been Hindy’s support for controversial developer and New Jersey Nets owner Bruce Ratner, the driving force behind the atrocious Atlantic Yards project, a massive boondoggle that, if realized, will produce a taxpayer-subsidized basketball arena for Ratner’s Nets along with various office buildings and luxury complexes that will displace more than 40 business owners and tenants via eminent domain and other measures.
Still, what do you expect from the wolf's lair of New York's corrupt and massively regulated real estate market? As Hindy admitted to the New York Observer last year, "Things like the development at Coney Island and things like Atlantic Yards—that’s what we have to work with, and we have to make the best of it.”
Posted by eric at 9:21 AM
Higher-resolution arena renderings suggest how close glass would be to the street
Atlantic Yards Report
The 2008 edition of the New York Post's Brooklyn Tomorrow advertorial reproduces Frank Gehry renderings already in the Image Gallery on the Atlantic Yards web site, but the higher-resolution versions in the publication offer a clear reminder: the arena's glass walls would be quite close to the street, raising security concerns.
Remember, last fall, only after much prodding by the New York Times, Forest City Ratner acknowledged that the arena would be just 20 feet from the street at Flatbush Avenue and Atlantic Avenue, the same distance as in Newark, where officials have decided to close streets during arena events.
...Alan Rosner, who wrote a July 2005 White Paper, titled Terrorism, Security and the Proposed Brooklyn Atlantic Yards. High Rise and Arena Development Project (PDF), has continued to follow the issue.
"The renderings for the new AY arena & towers do point to a lack of meaningful setbacks from both Atlantic and Flatbush Avenues," Rosner told me. "FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) the GSA [General Services Administration] & DoD [Department of Defense] all indicate that the single most effective mitigation for explosions is distance from the blast. By any standard 20 feet is too close to the curb."
NoLandGrab: Elected officials who called for a comprehensive security review last November are still waiting for a meaningful response from the developer and state agencies.
Posted by eric at 8:55 AM
July 22, 2008
Top Ten Reasons why Kensington is better than Park Slope
Kensington Stories
Kensington Stories blogger Ron Lopez included this curious item among the "reasons why Kensington is better than Park Slope" (debatable, but we do believe in pride of place) in a post last week:
4 We know that “ugly” train yard on Atlantic Avenue is actually ugly, and are not fooled by the “Develop don’t destroy Brooklyn” people.
NoLandGrab: We're not quite sure how DDDB is fooling anyone, and as far as we know, nobody ever said the train yard wasn't ugly. We're also pretty certain that neither DDDB nor yours truly would be around to fool people if Bruce Ratner had proposed building a project only above the 8.3-acre railyard. It's a safe bet that had Bruce and the ESDC targeted Mr. Lopez's Kensington community, they'd have found "blight" where Mr. Lopez sees a great neighborhood (is that lovely house pictured above built to at least 60% of its available Floor Area Ratio?).
Posted by eric at 12:36 PM
Columbia University Plan Could Impact Atlantic Yards
Opponents of Both Have Said State Abuses Eminent Domain
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
by Ranaan Geberer (and AP)
The Empire State Development Corp. (ESDC) has given preliminary approval to Columbia University’s plan to build new housing, laboratories and other facilities in West Harlem, which may force some property owners to give up their land — an issue which is somewhat related to Atlantic Yards.
The agency also ruled that two studies had found the neighborhood where Columbia wants to build is full of old, obsolete buildings in deteriorating condition. Declaring the area blighted gives the state the power to force the sale of private owners’ land needed for the expansion.
Two property owners say they don’t want to sell to Columbia, and have vowed to fight the expansion in court.
This issue is basically similar to the Atlantic Yards battle in Brooklyn, since opponents of that sports-housing-office proposal have also filed suit against the possibility of eminent domain.
NoLandGrab: Yes, "the issue is basically similar," but as for how Columbia's plan "could impact Atlantic Yards," we're not quite sure what the Eagle's headline writers are getting at.
Posted by eric at 9:45 AM
At MCNY panel, defending dissent and promoting the better way to develop (not like Atlantic Yards)
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder reports from a panel discussion last Thursday at the Museum of the City of New York that went a little off-topic.
But the Civic Talk, sponsored by Henry Stern’s New York Civic and titled “What If? Battles Over Development,” was notable for some rhetorical disagreement about the nature of civic opposition and some strong opinions on the right way to develop in New York. And Atlantic Yards came up not as a good example but as something to be avoided.
...[Urban Planner Alexander] Garvin then criticized government projects and, apparently, public-private partnerships like those pursued by the ESDC: “And we would stop having this ridiculous argument that we constantly have about the government going to get involved in developing property on its own. I think the government should be not developing real estate. The government should be doing its investing in its infrastructure and its own property. And there is a great deal of it. We do not maintain our streets well. We have collapsed bridges everywhere.”
“And finally this city has begun to do the kind of investment that it did in the 19th century, and that I believe would help deal with a lot of what Al Butzel is talking about," he said. "If we stopped talking about developing Atlantic Yards or developing these things and left private property to the private owners to develop and instead spent our money on the public realm, I think we’d get a lot of work [done].”
That drew significant applause.
Posted by eric at 9:35 AM
July 21, 2008
Love, from New York
Biloxi Sun-Herald
by Anita Lee
"Kids rule," says a mural at the Coast's latest KaBOOM! playground, built Saturday.
One of those kids would be Michael Carajohn, a 16-year-old from New York whose mother is a plastic surgeon on Fifth Avenue, stepfather Bruce Ratner owns the New Jersey Nets basketball team, and aunt happens to be Fox News political correspondent and Talk Radio maven Ellen Ratner.
Even in this family, Carajohn is no slacker. He accompanied his aunt to Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina because the images he saw on television broke his heart.
"I've lived in New York all my life," Carajohn said. "I've never seen anything like that. It was inconceivable to me. I was shocked when I saw it on TV, but when I came down here, I was completely floored."
Carajohn has returned 30 times to help the community. What's more, he worked to get a basketball court built for the children of DeLisle.
On Saturday his aunt, mother and stepfather joined 377 volunteers who built the playground on the grounds of what will be the Marsha Barbour Community Resource Center.
NoLandGrab: Kudos to young Michael, his mother, and even stepfather Bruce for pitching in to help build a new playground along the still-ravaged Mississippi coast. Some Prospect Heights residents might be down there pitching in, too, if they weren't preoccupied with trying to stop Bruce from knocking down and rebuilding their own neighborhood.
Posted by eric at 3:10 PM
Asking feds not to approve tax-exempt bonds for AY arena, DDDB criticizes city/state letter
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder posted the highlights from Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn's (DDDB) letter to the IRS, in which the group made the case against reopening a federal tax loophole for Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards project.
Some of [DDDB's] criticisms were first reported in this blog: the letter overstates how much land Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner actually controls and it fails to point out that, at least according to available evidence, the foregone property tax might be much less than the anticipated PILOT payment. Also, DDDB points out that the city and state overstate the amount of progress achieved on the project.
...
At stake is a benefit --the difference between tax-exempt and taxable bonds--to arena developer Forest City Ratner worth an estimated $165 million on $800 million worth of bonds for a $950 million arena. The burden would fall mainly on federal taxpayers--hence the interest of the city and state in getting it passed. Should the “loophole” not be preserved for the arena, there might be increasing pressure on the city and state to increase local subsidies for the facility.While DDDB’s concerns may be seen as more parochial than concerns about tax-exempt financing for sports facilities expressed by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) and Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, the specific criticisms in the letter likely had not been raised previously in direct communication to IRS and the Department of the Treasury.
Posted by lumi at 5:29 AM
Will LeBron be a Knick, a Net or remain a Cav?
NYC Sports
By Sam Smith
Bruce Ratner's NJ Nets are unloading large player contracts, in hopes of vying for LeBron James when his contract is up with Cleveland in 2010.
Meanwhile, not everyone is buying Bruce's story that a new arena will be ready by the 2010-2011 season.
It's a long time away, especially if you have to endure two more seasons with New York media and fans.
The Nets really don't since it doesn't look like they'll get to Brooklyn and a new arena until maybe 2011, if at all. We assume they will since they now are officially as lame as a duck with a broken leg.
Having traded Jason Kidd in February, which was a terrific move in swindling the Dallas Mavericks out of Devin Harris and a No. 1 pick in 2010 that should be in the lottery with the Mavs in full collapse, and Jefferson recently, the Nets are in full rebuilding mode.
There's an old scouting saying around the NBA that "if you are going to make a mistake, make it big."
Posted by lumi at 5:08 AM
July 20, 2008
Citigroup Puts Its Money Where Its Name Will Be
NY Times
RICHARD SANDOMIR
What will happen to naming rights deals as the economy suffers? The NY Times looks at Citi Field, which Citibank promises to follow through with, even if it doesn't make much sense for business. Barclays also sticks to its promises, while the Times sticks to its claims that an arena would be open in 2010:
Another bank, Barclays, followed Citigroup by a few months with its 20-year, $400 million naming-rights deal for the Nets’ arena near downtown Brooklyn.Barclays, based in Britain, lacked Citigroup’s substantial presence in the United States and viewed the arena — whenever the Barclays Center’s long-delayed construction starts — as part of an aggressive domestic brand-building plan. But like Citigroup, it has had problems in the credit market, with $6.5 billion in write-downs on its banking scorecard. To shore up its capital position, Barclays recently sold $8.9 billion in new stock.
The bank, which sponsors the Premier League and a PGA Tour event in the FedEx Cup playoffs, is still linked with the Nets, who are seeking a 2010 arena opening if construction starts soon. On Friday, Brett Yormark, the president of Nets Sports and Entertainment, called Barclays a “stable and dynamic institution that is thriving in a very challenging marketplace.”
Brandon Ashcraft, a bank spokesman, said, “Barclays is fully committed to its relationship with the Nets.”
Posted by amy at 4:00 PM
Interviews on Atlantic Yards Report, WSJ, and points north
Field of Schemes
I keep meaning to find a moment to mention the multipart interview that Norman Oder did with me and is posting in bits to his Atlantic Yards Report blog; now that segment #4, addressing the would-be savior of scandal-ridden ACORN, went up yesterday, what better time than now?
Posted by amy at 12:22 PM
36 Hours in NYC
VAPERS
Freddy's Bar figures into the best 36 hours of someone's life. How lucky are the neighborhood residents that get to visit Freddy's regularly enough to have spent 36 (non-contiguous, we hope) hours at Freddy's?
Right after the movie, we walked about three or four blocks to Freddy’s Bar which is just another highlight of some of the best 36 hours I have yet to have in my life. Freddy’s is a Brooklyn attraction for a host of reasons: affordable beer, a great old school bar, a relaxed crowd, its public attacks against the Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project (one that will further divide and gentrify this great city within a city). But if I were to be honest, the reason I love to go to Freddy’s is for Donald O’Finn’s “TV Dreams” - a never ending series of VHS tapes featuring the most tripped out and intelligent re-cuts of movie clips, commercials, and various other resources you can imagine.
Posted by amy at 12:03 PM
On the new Yankee Stadium, two very different calculations in the NY Times (Zimbalist vs. deMause)
Atlantic Yards Report
From a 1/22/06 op-ed in the New York Times by sports economist Andrew Zimbalist, headlined Fair Ball:
The Yankees are proposing a fair financial deal to the city. Nationally, during the last 15 years, the public share in stadium development costs (that is, the stadium plus roads, utilities and so forth) for professional sports has averaged around 75 percent. The Yankees are planning to spend $800 million of their own money on the new stadium (no major league baseball team has spent more than $300 million on their own playing field). The city and state together will spend about $210 million for improvements in the neighborhood. By this reckoning, the public share is only about 21 percent.A different view
From a 7/17/08 essay by Tommy Craggs, headlined Goodbye Ghosts, Hello Hefty Tax Bill:
As the excellent book "Field of Schemes" by Neil DeMause puts it, Steinbrenner’s tenure has been "little more than one long plea for a new city-financed ballpark," a wish that will be fulfilled when the new stadium next door opens in 2009, at a public cost that DeMause estimates will be just south of a billion dollars.Many of those public costs are not direct subsidies, as deMause explains. But the distinction sure is worth sorting out.
Why? If Zimbalist's narrow view, which excludes many benefits to the team owners, is incorrect, well, not only is his defense of Yankee Stadium untenable, so is his (easily-criticized) analysis of the impact of Atlantic Yards.
Posted by amy at 11:58 AM
Double Edge to Brooklyn’s Success
NY Times
PATRICK McGEEHAN
Brooklyn Brewery's Steve Hindy reaps what he helped sow: rising prices from the rezoning laws and out of scale projects he championed were a death knell to small, local businesses, including his...
Mr. Hindy said the company could expand its local production to more than 40,000 barrels a year, and more than double its current payroll of 35 people, if it found a space that was large enough. But that quest has left Mr. Hindy feeling unappreciated by city officials.He was a champion of the rezoning of Williamsburg and Greenpoint that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg pushed through in 2005. But now he contends that the changes went too far by allowing a variety of nonindustrial uses of land in areas that are labeled industrial business zones.
...
“Once you name your company Brooklyn Brewery, you kind of take away the threat of moving to New Jersey,” Mr. Hindy said.
article
NoLandGrab: We venture to bet that more than one person would appreciate the irony of "New Jersey Brewery."
Gumby Fresh adds a sympathetic yet critical missive to the discourse, concluding in this thought:
But here's the killer line. "Some landlords are holding onto industrial property with the hope that it will be rezoned for residential buildings." So all Hindy's support has done is dump a windfall in the hands of condo developers with no interest in helping Hindy get what he wants. There's an easy moral to this story. The old lady and the snake.
Posted by amy at 11:46 AM
July 19, 2008
Will Olin's open space designs surface in September? Probably not
Atlantic Yards Report
Shortly after new designs for the Atlantic Yards arena and one building were released on May 5, I wrote on May 8 that the magazine Landscape Architecture, published by the American Society of Landscape Architects, predicted coverage of Atlantic Yards in the June and September issues.The June issue is out and the Design section did not include an article on Atlantic Yards.
When's it coming?
Should we wait until September? Nope. A revised editorial calendar, as of 6/5/08, makes no mention of Atlantic Yards.
So we're left wondering what Olin plans as temporary landscaping for empty lots that, as the Municipal Art Society suggested, might turn into Atlantic Lots.
Posted by amy at 9:55 AM
ESDC To Further Columbia's 7M-SF Expansion Plan
Globe St
The Empire State Development Corp. board of directors has adopted the Columbia University General Project Plan and authorized a public hearing to formally approve the University’s proposed expansion this fall. The $6.28-billion Manhattanville expansion project, which has had some opposition from local Harlem residents, who worry about displacement, will add up to 6.8 million sf of new facilities in up to 16 new buildings and in an adaptively reused existing building.
...
The ESDC determined the 17-acre area in Harlem "blighted" on Thursday, and according to the anonymous urban affairs source, once the ESDC determines an area is blighted, it has the authority to "undertake the condemnation." The source notes that this is the same concept that was used in Atlantic Yards. In that case, the US Court of Appeals court rejected a lawsuit that challenged the constitutionality of the state's use of eminent domain for the site.
Posted by amy at 9:35 AM
Activism for every attention span
Time Out New York
Jaime Jordan
NoLandGrab might not be a moment of zen, but we're 5 minutes of pithiness:
“The city is catering to megadevelopers while completely ignoring the needs of New Yorkers,” says Candace Carpenter of Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn. The Atlantic Yards is probably the city’s best-known battleground, but New Yorkers are channeling Jane Jacobs all over the five boroughs. While issues like affordable housing and eminent domain drive many of these campaigns, Deborah Marton, executive director of the Design Trust for Public Space, believes that “environmental quality and sustainability” are also major concerns.5 MINUTES!
If you don’t have time to volunteer with an agency, make a donation to the Design Trust (designtrust.org), or take a $15 walking tour with the Municipal Art Society (mas.org)—both organizations advocate for responsible use of public space. “And remain educated by reading about development issues,” says Marton. She suggests The Architect’s Newspaper (archpaper.com) or Brownstowner (brownstoner.com). If you’re following the Atlantic Yards action, though, the blog No Land Grab (nolandgrab.org) provides a pithy overview of events.“You can yell and scream about development, but you have to contact the legislator to make a difference,” says Carpenter. “Also, elect officials who aren’t beholden to big real-estate money.” To look up your New York City Council representative, go to council.nyc.gov. At Place Matters (placematters.net), you can raise awareness about noteworthy buildings and sites in your community—thus making them harder to bulldoze—and a $50 membership in the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation (gvshp.org) gives you reduced rates on events like lectures and walking tours, plus information on how to report landmark violations.
“Join your community board. That’s the main avenue for average residents to get involved,” explains Marton. “They can have an influence on everything about a new project, including use, scale and appearance.” For meeting and membership details, go to nyc.gov/cau. If you’re more interested in preserving the city skyline, GVSHP had two job openings at press time (gvshp.org/employment.htm). And if you’re in it for the really long haul, consider a career in urban planning: The American Planning Association’s New York Metro Chapter (nyplanning.org) provides information on approved courses and employment opportunities.
article
NoLandGrab: TONY Left out Brooklyn's favorite form of activism...wearing DDDB t-shirts.
Posted by amy at 9:13 AM
July 18, 2008
National ACORN's (episode of) scandal, and NY ACORN's dubious Brooklyn stadium deal (in 2000)
Atlantic Yards Report
ACORN founder [and former national director] Wade Rathke wrote 3/1/07 on his blog about AY:
Surprisingly, we found ourselves on the opposite side of the divide among the Park Slope liberals and others who were unwilling to join us in making the diversity of the community the core issue.
As Norman Oder examines ACORN NYC's role in a previous Brooklyn stadium controversy, you gotta worry that Rathke's head scratching might be genuine; if so, he missed the part about how Bertha Lewis cut a deal and sold out her coalition partners, who, incidentally, fought on.
The result was a win-win for everyone involved: local stakeholders benefitted from the renovation of the Parade Grounds, the Mets built the minor league ballpark in Coney Island (a location much better served by public transporation) and jobs were created.
But Bertha Lewis's penchant for being a solo broker for the community left one journalist a little suspicious. From Oder's interview with Neil deMause:
Q. Was there a parallel with the Atlantic Yards affordable housing agreement signed by ACORN?
A. It just happened much earlier in the Nets deal. She sold out or bought in, depending on how you want to put it, very early. Ok, fine, if you’re going to give me what I want, then I’ll go for it. There are arguments for doing CBAs [Community Benefits Agreements] where, if developer does do enough things for the community, then that’s OK, people buy in.
The problem of course is that Bertha didn’t get together with everybody in the community and say, OK, let’s figure out what the community wants, and let’s present a list of demands to Ratner and, until you make us all happy, we’re not going to go along with it. It’s that I’m going to cut a deal for myself and everybody else is then the enemy.
So, yeah, speaking of people who’ve lost credibility. I mean, ACORN’s done a lot of good things, and I’m sure Bertha has done good things in her time, but she definitely has this capacity for selling her support for projects based more on narrow self-interest of her and the organization rather than what’s good for community or the city. That’s disappointing, to say the least.