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August 10, 2009
Business as usual: Times notes Ratner's seeking more housing subsidies, but ignores lack of a cost-benefit analysis (and omits disclosure)
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder parses today's Atlantic Yards coverage in The New York Times.
There are a couple of notable things about the New York Times article today headlined Atlantic Yards’ Developer Races a Court Hearing, a Bond Deadline and Opponents.
First, it portrays the project through the perspective of the developer, while not acknowledging that Forest City Ratner never testified at the public hearing last month (which the Times didn't cover in print, only on The Local, the blog aimed at Fort Greene and Clinton Hill). Second, it states that new renderings of the arena will be released, likely before Labor Day, but--it goes unmentioned--that likely would be after the opportunity for public comment ends on August 31.
Third, it reveals that Forest City Ratner has sought additional housing subsidies from the city, despite the careful statement by FCR executive MaryAnne Gilmartin last month that “Forest City does not expect to ask for more subsidy.”
The reason that's news: while Forest City is now framing Atlantic Yards as an affordable housing project, the developer won't build the affordable housing without sufficient city subsidies. And we still don't know--though serious doubts have been raised by experts like Michelle de la Uz of the Fifth Avenue Committee--how the cost-per-unit compares to alternatives.
Posted by eric at August 10, 2009 9:23 AM