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June 2, 2009
ESDC: Atlantic Yards Project Will Shrink
GlobeSt.com
by Cody Lyon
Lyon gives Norman Oder a run for his money in terms of word count, but Atlantic Yards Report beat GlobeSt to the punch by some 90 hours, give or take. And we don't think ESDC admitted to any shrinkage, except maybe in arena fit and finish.
[Independent Budget Office Deputy Director George] Sweeting noted that current plans call for the Atlantic Yards arena, much like Yankee Stadium and Citi Field, to be financed through an "aggressive interpretation of Internal Revenue Service regulations that will make it possible to use tax exempt bonds for most, if not all, of the arena’s construction costs"--provided they break ground by the end of the year. However, he said, in the previous stadiums’ cases, the city finance department indicated what the property tax assessments would be prior to the start of construction. In the case of Atlantic Yards, he said no similar announcement had been made. But he did say it was notable that the land assessments for the parcels under the arena have more than “tripled in the last three years.”
NoLandGrab: If land assessments have indeed "tripled in the last three years," doesn't that mean that the Vanderbilt Yard, appraised by the MTA in 2005 at $214.5 million, is now worth $643.5 million? And if so, why is the MTA apparently going to allow Forest City to back pedal even more from its already-low balled "commitment"?
As with just about everything else Atlantic Yards, these numbers just don't add up.
Posted by eric at June 2, 2009 1:25 PM