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August 20, 2009
Sparks fly at public advocate TV debate
YourNabe.com
By Jeremy Walsh
The hot topic was eminent domain at Willets Point, Queens in a debate between candidates for NYC Public Advocate, sponsored by the Community Newspaper Group, to be aired tonight on BCAT at 9pm.
The most heated rhetoric came when the candidates differed on the issue of the massive Willets Point redevelopment and the use of eminent domain, the process by which a government can seize privately owned land for the public good.
[NYC Councilman Bill] De Blasio said he supported eminent domain in “very certain circumstances,” including the Queens project.
“I think it is valid if it creates a substantial number of new jobs and affordable housing, and I think Willets Point does that,” he said.
[NYC Councilman Eric] Gioia called the practice “absolutely wrong.”
“The very presence of it changes the terms of the bargain,” he said, comparing a municipality with eminent domain power to a gun-wielding Al Capone.
[Former Public Advocate Mark] Green openly supported the Willets Point redevelopment.
“If it comes to eminent domain, the city should go out of its way to relocate those small businesses within the community, to the extent it can,” he said.
[Civil rights attorney Norman ] Siegel decried eminent domain abuse and called Willets Point “unconstitutional.”
“The city did not provide services to the businesses out there,” he said.
Sparks flew as the candidates spent some time squabbling over the finer points of the Supreme Court decision that enabled public-private redevelopments via eminent domain.
“I think Eric Gioia should be given a chance to retract his comparison of the mayor and Council to Al Capone with a gun,” Green said.
Gioia did not.
NoLandGrab: Gioia's point was obviously lost on Green — it borders on extortion when the government uses the threat of a coercive power to force property owners to strike a deal. Owners have little choice but to sell and only those who have the stomach for a fight against the government remain.
Siegel referred to the absurd fact that, for decades, NY City steadfastly refused to provide basic municipal services to the neighborhood, thus greasing the skids for the use of eminent domain to clear "blight," as in the "blight" created by the City's own neglect.
Posted by lumi at August 20, 2009 5:27 AM