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September 25, 2009
In Brooklyn, From Ratner to Russians
$ports Money (Forbes.com)
by Bruce Upbin
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn, the community group that's been successfully fighting Forest City Ratner's New Jersey Nets arena development for years, now has someone even richer and more shadowy and powerful to contend with: Mikhail Prokhorov, the Russian mining billionaire.
...But let's not kid ourselves. This is not a basketball deal; it's about real estate, although some media outlets are echoing the bit on Prokhorov's blog about how he loves the NBA's "super-modern" coaching methods. The mining magnate would turn the Nets into a farm team for a pro hoops league in Russia. Right, like that's going to happen. Meanwhile, the AP is reporting that Prokhorov has made a lot of Russians angry that he is buying into America and not investing in Russia. Details about the deal are still slightly fuzzy but it's pretty clear to us that he's buying the team to get access to Bruce Ratner's troubled Atlantic yards real estate development in downtown Brooklyn.
Related coverage...
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn, Prokhorov Making Real Estate Play, Not Sports? So Says Forbes
How big a foot is Russian oligarch Mikhail Prokhorov trying to get in to Bruce Ratner's real estate door? And if this is indeed a real estate play for the billionaire, rather than a sports play as he claims, then Brooklyn's politicians (and ACORN and Bloomberg and Paterson and Markowitz and Schumer) ought to wake up, becasue Mikhail Prokhorov never even promised affordable housing and the housing agencies will not readily hand over subsidies to an unknown entity.
Posted by eric at September 25, 2009 10:47 AM