« Nets-to-Newark plan draws cautious response from leading Democrats | Main | Lost in Translation »
October 25, 2009
Atlantic Yards Report Sunday Supplement
Atlantic Yards Report
CNG Watch: Brooklyn Paper covers the latest lawsuit; Courier-Life focuses on Jeffries
How are the local Brooklyn papers doing in covering the proposed Atlantic Yards development?
The Brooklyn Paper, which led with a hard-hitting article on a gingko tree, did publish (on p. 5) an article on the latest suit challenging Atlantic Yards, though that article was dated October 22 and the suit was filed on October 19.
Gersh Kuntzman's Brooklyn Paper article stated:
None of the prior agreements — including two approved general project plans — made the affordable housing conditional on any state or local support. Ratner was required to build the units whether subsidies were available or not.
Actually, the units were never guaranteed; I reported on the new language more than a month ago.
The Brooklyn Paper did get an optimistic quote from ACORN's Bertha Lewis, which inspired scornful skepticism from Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn. (Note that, while DDDB said the project would get "over $1 billion in scarce housing subsidies," it's actually "scarce housing bonds.")
And, as noted, the Brooklyn Paper published an odd editorial on the obligation to build affordable housing, blaming the state but not the developer.
...
The Courier-Life, not surprisingly, ignored the latest lawsuit, but made a page 2 story the seeming gyrations on Atlantic Yards by Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries--an episode ignored by its sibling Brooklyn Paper.
However, given the newspaper's deadlines, it caught only the initial letter Jeffries co-signed and then his clarification, missing the legislator's public comments on Thursday night.
Adding to the story, the newspaper's Stephen Witt reported:
Some political watchdogs speculate that Jeffries signed onto the letter because of his rumored ambition to succeed Rep. Ed Towns in the 10th Congressional District. A large part of Towns’ district is in the Canarsie/Flatlands area, which both Sampson and Perry partially represent.
The construction boom is over; whither AY?
Norman Oder connects the dots to show why building the proposed Atlantic Yards project makes no sense.
From the New York Building Congress (NYBC):
The residential market has experienced a precipitous decline after an unprecedented boom period. After five consecutive years in which residential construction exceeded 30,000 new dwelling units, the Building Congress projects construction of just under 6,300 units with a total construction value of $3.5 billion in 2009. The forecast calls for 7,900 units ($4.0 billion) to be produced in 2010 and 9,900 units ($5.0 billion) in 2011. These 24,000 units constructed between 2009 and 2011 will fall 10,000 units short of what was constructed in 2008 alone.
According to the New York Times, the market for commercial space is even worse than the NYBC suggests--which, unmentioned, makes the short-term prospects for Building 1, the commercial tower planned for the Atlantic Yards project, not-so-likely, as even the Empire State Development Corporation acknowledged in June:
“They’re way too exuberant,” the developer Douglas Durst said of the report. Commercial vacancy rates are continuing to rise, he said, and rents are falling.
...
GlobeSt.com reports on the NYBC's breakfast:
Then, onto Brooklyn and another case of stalling at the lawsuit-laden Atlantic Yards standoff. In response to a question from GlobeSt.com, [New York City Economic Development Corporation President Seth] Pinsky said, "another lawsuit is easy to file, but less easy to win." He says his agency is working very hard with the developers and the state to get the project’s details in order.
"We remain hopeful they’ll be able to make it to the financing market before the end of the year, but, this is a tricky project," he told GlobeSt.com Wednesday. "And, until everything is in place, you don’t know that it will be in place, but we remain optimistic and we hope the project will in fact move forward."
When pressed with what happens if the lawsuits do work, and there is a successful delay of the project’s successful trip to the financing markets, Pinsky stood pat, saying "we think this project is going to move forward, and that’s what we’re planning for."
DDDB says Pinsky should have a Plan B.
And what about the housing market? Presumably a decline in new construction makes it easier for the projected Atlantic Yards housing units to be absorbed, as the KPMG market study for the Empire State Development Corporation suggests. Then again, that study is not very reliable.
As a Bronx CBA awaits, challenges to labor solidarity
The idea of a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA), at least as pioneered in Los Angeles, is a united front presented by all parties, including labor unions. In the Bronx, as Crain's reports, unity doesn't come easy:
Organized labor's previously united front on $10-an-hour retail jobs at the Kingsbridge Armory splintered Friday, with the umbrella organization representing 100,000 unionized construction workers publicly declaring support for a redevelopment project by Related Cos. that would deliver 1,000 construction jobs to it[s] members.
No CBA has yet been signed regarding the Kingsbridge Armory.
Contrasts with AY
Regarding Atlantic Yards, Forest City Ratner has promised unionized building service jobs in the residential towers, thus leading to support of Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ, which is not a signatory of the AY CBA. Nor are the construction unions.
There are no guarantees about minimum retail wages in the AY CBA, so that hasn't been an issue--perhaps because Atlantic Yards, in contrast to the Kingsbridge Armory, is not primarily a retail project.
Posted by steve at October 25, 2009 9:07 AM